‘We’re having a gorgeous summer, aren’t we?’ she continued, addressing the man now, who jiggled his leg nervously under the table and didn’t say a word. ‘I don’t know your name?’ Still he said nothing.
‘It’s Osiris,’ the boy piped up. ‘Osiris Turner.’
Liz smiled. ‘That’s unusual. Where does it come from?’
At last Osiris opened his mouth to speak.
‘I...’ he started. ‘We...’
‘Yes?’ said Liz encouragingly, but he shook his head, unable to go on.
Liam waited a few moments, looking at his father hopefully, but it was no good.
‘My dad wants to know if you’ve got any leftovers for us to take home,’ he blurted, lowering his eyes at the same time and staring hard at the table.
Liz paused. It was perfectly obvious that they were in desperate need, yet Mike had mentioned that he’d been up to their cottage only last Friday with a couple of bags of unused food. In fact, he’d been making a habit of it recently, and he’d checked that they were getting all the benefits they were entitled to, so what was going on?
Keen to establish the facts, she chatted with the boy about this and that – football, television programmes, video games (a favourite topic) – until she could steer the subject deftly on to his preferred foods.
‘Did you enjoy the things I brought you that time?’ she enquired, while Osiris stared vacantly into his empty teacup.
Liam looked shifty. ‘They were all right.’
‘Did Shannon heat you up some of that pasta with the red sauce?’
‘Nah.’ Liam kicked his legs back and forth under the table. ‘Didn’t fancy it.’
It took her a while, but little by little she winkled out the truth. Osiris, it seemed, had been selling the food they’d been given in order to fund a brand-new console for Liam, along with a pile of video games, and had made up the rest of the cash with benefits money.
‘You promised you’d get me one, didn’t you, Dad?’ Liam said, leaning across the table and shaking his father’s arm. ‘Didn’t you?’ the boy repeated loudly.
This time the man muttered, ‘Yes.’
Liam leaned back, pleased. ‘You see?’ he said proudly. ‘He’s like that, me dad. My sister went ballistic, but he always keeps his promises.’
Now Liz was beginning to understand their predicament. The cupboards were bare and Shannon, probably so disgusted with her father’s profligacy, had forced him to come here to get a meal for himself and the boys.
‘I’ll see what we’ve got,’ she said, rising. No one would argue with her decision.
When she returned a few minutes later with two large carrier bugs stuffed with groceries, the man seemed quite overcome.
‘Thank you.’ His hands shook as he took the bags from her. ‘I’m grateful to you for your kindness.’
It was the first time that she’d properly heard his voice. She was about to help him to the door when he unexpectedly grabbed her arm. He was so quick that she didn’t have time to pull away.
‘Don’t mention this to anyone, will you?’ he pleaded, fixing her with watery brown eyes rimmed with deep, criss-crossing lines.
Liz hesitated. She knew exactly whom he meant, of course – social services, who might take the children away.
‘You can’t go buying expensive toys when you haven’t enough to feed the children,’ she said firmly.
The man swallowed. ‘I know.’
‘You might think you’re being kind, but they need to eat and so do you. You’ve got to get your priorities right.’
‘I will.’
‘Promise me you won’t do a silly thing like that again.’
She watched as he shuffled off with Liam, weighed down with a heavy carrier each, and when they’d left she headed over to Robert, who was helping to clear the tables.
‘He’s in a dreadful state, poor chap,’ he said gravely, and his wife nodded.
‘You should tell the authorities. Discuss it with Mike and Jenny. You can’t have children going hungry in this day and age; it’s a scandal.’
The suggestion made Liz shudder, although part of her thought that her husband was right.
‘The man’s sick for sure,’ she replied. ‘And he certainly doesn’t know how to look after his kids properly. But he loves them and they love him, and separation would utterly devastate them.’
She remembered the gentle way that Shannon had picked up her little brother, Liam’s concern about his dad, the neatly tended flowerbeds leading up to their front door.
‘No,’ she went on, pulling herself up to her full height and ignoring Robert’s doubtful expression. ‘There simply has to be another way.’
14
SATURDAY MORNING ARRIVED and leaving Cornwall was a terrible wrench for Bramble. As she looked out of her bedroom window she could see the sun glittering on the bright-blue ocean, and when Katie appeared in her fluorescent-pink bikini, clutching a magazine and towel, all set for a lazy day lounging in the garden, it felt like a double blow.
Bramble dragged her feet getting ready and ended up departing far later than intended, so that by the time she spotted signs for the M25 it was already three thirty p.m., and if she didn’t put her foot down, she’d miss her father’s ‘light bite’ before the dreaded belly-dancing display.
As soon as she pulled into the familiar Chessington street, lined with mock-Tudor semis, and stopped in front of her parents’ house, Cassie dashed out, cheeks flushed and eyes shining. She must have been peering through the vertical cream blinds in the front window, keeping watch.
‘It’s been so long!’ she cried, scarcely giving Bramble time to leave the car before enveloping her in a hug. Cassie’s bosom was as soft as a pillow and she smelled of lavender perfume and hairspray. ‘Let me take a peek. I’d forgotten what you look like!’
Being back in her old house felt strange to Bramble: easy and comforting, yet somehow different, too, for although she had only been away for three weeks, so much had happened. Bill carried her small bag upstairs before retiring to the kitchen, where he could be heard clattering about, opening and closing cupboards, rattling pans and whizzing up ingredients in the blender. She was amused. So much for their simple supper, she thought. It sounded as if he were preparing a banquet.
She and Cassie sat side by side on the plush red sofa in the sitting room, sipping tea and catching up on news, but it wasn’t long before Bill appeared again – with a white tea towel hung, waiter-style, on his arm – and summoned them with a flourish for their ‘pre-performance meal’.
‘Mesdames, your repast awaits,’ he announced in a fake French accent, before ushering them into the dining room at the front of the house, where the table was laid with a lacy white cloth and Cassie’s best cutlery and crystal wine glasses. Then he vanished again for a moment and returned with three large bowls of steaming seafood broth on a tray.
‘What’s this?’ Cassie asked, eyeing the food that he put in front of her and sniffing suspiciously.
‘Teriyaki prawns and broccoli noodles,’ Bill said proudly. ‘It’s Japanese, doncha know. I thought we’d try something different for a change.’
After Maria’s unappetising grub, Bramble would secretly have preferred Cassie’s plain but delicious shepherd’s pie or her tasty chicken hotpot, but she didn’t let on.
‘Yum,’ she said, picking up a prawn and twizzling some brownish buckwheat noodles around her wooden chopsticks. ‘What a treat!’
‘Very unusual,’ Cassie commented, rejecting her own chopsticks in favour of a spoon and fork, which Bill had thoughtfully placed alongside. ‘I like prawns, but I’m not keen on that raw fish they’re so fond of, are you? I’d rather have a nice bit of battered haddock and a bag of chips.’
Bill was so excited, jumping up and down to refill the women’s glasses with water or white wine and bustling into the kitchen to check on pudding, that he scarcely ate any of the broth himself.
‘I had a big lunch,’ he insisted wh
en Cassie pointed this out. ‘But you eat up, love. You’ll need plenty of energy for your dancing.’
Cassie dutifully obliged, though it was clearly a struggle, and Bramble hoped that her stepmother’s supper wouldn’t make an unfortunate reappearance during the course of the evening.
Pudding was a rather more traditional lemon meringue pie, which Bramble eagerly demolished before requesting seconds. Then Cassie went upstairs to get ready while father and daughter sat and talked. Bill wouldn’t allow Bramble to help clear away; he said her time at home was too precious.
‘We’ll have plenty of opportunity to wash the dishes when you’ve gone.’
At around six, Sheila arrived in her car to collect Cassie, and half an hour later Bill and Bramble made their way up the road to the shabby 1960s-built concert hall. The performance wasn’t until seven thirty p.m., but the tickets weren’t numbered and he was anxious to get good seats. The last time Bramble was here, she’d been around twelve years old and had had to endure a particularly lengthy rendition of Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius. With luck, tonight’s show would be rather more accessible.
The grubby white walls, linoleum floor and strip lighting, coupled with a faint smell of bleach, gave the hall the air of a down-at-heel doctor’s surgery. The faded yellow curtains at the windows were only three quarters drawn, and a shaft of light from outside illuminated myriad particles of dust that seemed to dance before Bramble’s eyes and scoot up her nose, making her want to sneeze.
To her surprise, Bill had so far tactfully avoided the subject of Matt, so it was a tremendous shock when she saw him stroll through the open doors and glance around the hall, already half-filled with the dancers’ supportive friends and relatives and humming with enthusiastic chatter. She hadn’t told him that she was coming, ostensibly because it was only to be a flying visit, though in truth she was anxious to avoid the dreaded heart-to-heart that Katie had insisted she must have.
‘What’s he doing here?’ she asked, alarmed, before she could stop herself, and Bill stood up and waved.
‘He asked to come,’ he said, unable to disguise the reproof in his voice. ‘He’s very fond of Cassie, you know. He wanted to support her – and to see you, of course,’ he added with a cough.
Matt’s eyes lit up when they fell on Bramble, and her stomach fluttered. He looked very handsome, in a collarless pale-blue shirt and jeans, his fairish hair neat and freshly washed, his shoulders broad and solid. Forgetting all her doubts and reservations, she had an overwhelming urge to run over and fling her arms around him. In fact, she might have done just that, were it not for the fact that her phone pinged loudly in her handbag, distracting her attention, and she reached inside to check.
Her heart missed a beat when she saw that it was a text from Piers.
Hey, Countess! she read. How’s the big smoke? I’ll call you tomorrow when you’re back.
His joky tone made her smile and the prospect of speaking to him again sent shivers up her spine. Quickly, she turned the phone to silent and managed to shove it in her bag just before Matt finished shuffling along the row of seats and settled down beside her.
It was hardly the moment for a passionate clinch, surrounded as they were by people, so he grabbed her hand instead and gave it a tight squeeze, not letting go even when a family – including Grandpa and Grannie, Dad, two smallish children and a noisy toddler – manoeuvred past and plonked on to the wooden chairs next door, dropping coats, bags, cartons of juice and packets of sweets as they went.
Despite the hubbub, she was acutely aware of his presence – his knees almost touching hers, their thighs pressed together – and she wondered what to do. She knew instinctively that he was expecting her to speak, but she had no idea what to say or how to express the confusing emotions swirling around her head, so instead she waited for him to open his mouth first.
‘I’ve missed you, Bram,’ he said at last, letting go of her hand, putting an arm around her shoulders and pulling her close.
‘Me, too,’ she replied, but her mouth was dry and she didn’t melt into his side as usual.
Sensing her strangeness, he stiffened, too.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?’ he asked, quite sharply now, staring straight ahead.
Bill, on Bramble’s other side, was talking to his neighbour, but he would have been able to hear if he pricked up his ears.
‘I – I only agreed at the last minute,’ she stammered, scrabbling around for something, any excuse, to grasp on to. ‘I’m just here for the performance. I didn’t think you’d be interested in belly-dancing.’
It sounded lame and unconvincing, and she wasn’t surprised when he put his hands in his lap, leaving a cold, empty space around her back where his arm had been.
‘We need to talk,’ he said heavily. ‘After the show?’
‘I can’t,’ she replied, quick as a flash; she was panicking. ‘I promised my parents I’d spend the whole evening with them.’
Matt turned now and stared at her, willing her to meet his gaze. Reluctantly, she did, and she could see that his soft grey eyes were troubled and that hurt hung, screen-like, just behind the irises. Unable to bear it, she glanced away.
‘I’ll be back again soon,’ she went on fake-cheerily. ‘We can chat properly then. I’m sorry I’m in such a rush. Dad basically begged me to come for Cassie’s sake, and you know what he’s like. I couldn’t refuse.’
Silence descended while Matt processed her words, so it was a relief when someone dragged the yellow curtains all the way across the windows and turned off the overhead lights. Gradually, the chattering around her ceased, but still she barely heard when a man in a dark suit got up on stage to introduce the troupe and explain a little about the history of belly- dancing. In fact, she wondered why the audience members were laughing, for the jokes passed her by completely.
At last the music commenced and about ten dancers appeared in a blaze of colour, swirling hips and flashing sequins, including Cassie, at one end, in a beaded bra top and peacock-blue harem pants with a matching chiffon scarf twined seductively around her head. Mostly, the women danced together, but from time to time one would take centre stage, shimmying sinuously into the spotlight, arms above her head and tummy rolling round and round, to rapturous applause and whoops of delight and amusement.
When it was Cassie’s turn, Bill nudged Bramble in the ribs.
‘Isn’t she fantastic?’ he whisper-shouted. ‘I had no idea!’
She was, indeed, surprisingly fluid in her movements, and from the look on her face it was clear that she was enjoying every moment. Bramble nodded and smiled at her father and joined in the clapping, but she was only going through the motions. All the while her attention was really focused on Matt, sitting motionless and brooding beside her.
Thankfully, there was no opportunity for soul-searching during the interval, because Bill was too busy introducing Matt and Bramble to friends and neighbours, who seemed far more interested in hearing what she thought of the dancing than in Cornwall or Polgarry Manor. After about twenty minutes everyone resumed their seats for the second half, and she racked her brains for what to say when the performance finished.
The lights went off, the music struck up once more and she was just telling herself that this time she really must concentrate, for Cassie would surely want an in-depth analysis afterwards, when Matt touched her on the knee.
‘I’m going,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘Say well done to Cassie and tell her I’m sorry I couldn’t congratulate her in person.’
Bramble’s eyes widened. ‘What? Why?’
But he shook his head and began to rise. ‘Let me know when you’re ready to speak.’
It sounded more like a rebuke than a request, and a familiar feeling of guilt washed over her, mingled with regret and sorrow.
‘Won’t you...?’ she began, hating herself, but he was already shaking Bill’s hand and pushing his way back along the row of seats towards the exit. She didn’t blame him fo
r leaving. She’d probably have done the same if he’d been as chilly and dishonest with her.
She watched him walk through the double doors and disappear from sight before turning her attention back to the troupe, who had been waiting in the wings. But she barely registered when Sheila stumbled on her veil and almost fell, or when Cassie twirled a set of flashing hoops around her tummy amidst frenzied drumming and gasps of admiration, the loudest of all from Bill.
All she could think of was the empty seat beside her and Matt heading home, unhappy, baffled and alone. It was only when she focused on Piers – his easy smile and languid, loose-limbed manner; the prospect of hearing his voice again – that she found she could blot out her boyfriend’s image, temporarily at least, and focus on tomorrow.
*
Matt didn’t try to contact her again that night, and Bramble returned to Polgarry early the following morning, determined to sort things out with him as soon as she’d marshalled her thoughts and, preferably, put them down on paper. She was aware, of course, that Pat’s funeral was imminent, and although she and Katie didn’t plan to attend, they’d already agreed between themselves to keep a respectful distance from the village and pubs until it was all over.
On Wednesday morning the Methodist church in Tremarnock was packed – so full, in fact, that some folk couldn’t find seats and had to stand at the back. The sun beamed through the arched windows and poured on to the two magnificent bouquets of yellow, red and vibrant orange flowers in the transept, so that they seemed to be on fire, and Liz found herself thinking that Pat would surely have approved. She’d organised the flowers every week for years until she’d become too frail, and yellow and orange had always been her favourite colours. She’d never been one for subtlety – she’d liked a really good show – and she’d have adored the gaudy pink and yellow sprays on the ends of the pews, too. Liz fancied that she could hear her now, making comments.
‘Just look at them. Aren’t they as pretty as a picture? A feast for the eyes!’
Tremarnock Summer Page 20