Miss Mary's Book of Dreams

by Sophie Nicholls

  Blonde hair swept back from her face. Chiselled profile. Long legs in skinny grey jeans, and black suede boots. The group of guys, including her customer, turned and looked.

  But it wasn’t. It wasn’t her. Ella was furious with herself. Why was she seeing Selena everywhere, imagining her everywhere, thinking about how she might bump into her every time she set foot outside the shop door?

  It was getting ridiculous. She’d only ever seen her once, from an upstairs window. She needed to just calm down.

  Oh, God. The customer guy was coming over to them now. His eyes locked on hers. She swallowed. She could feel her heart banging above the music.

  He reached the edge of their table.

  ‘Hi,’ he said, smiling at her, nodding at Florence and Laura. ‘I just wanted to come over and thank you. For the book. My girlfriend loved it. Really loved it. You got me major brownie points, I can tell you.’

  Ella swallowed again. ‘Oh, that’s brilliant. I’m so glad. Did she have a nice birthday?’

  ‘Yeah, great. Really great, in fact.’ He paused. He seemed to be about to say something else and then thought better of it. ‘Anyway, I hope you ladies have a lovely evening.’

  He made a little bow and turned on his heels.

  ‘He seems very nice,’ Laura said into her wine glass.

  ‘He so fancies you, El,’ Florence snorted. ‘Bloody hell. And he’s gorgeous.’

  Ella felt her stomach contract. She punched Laura in the arm. ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ she said. ‘I must be about ten years older than him.’

  ‘So?’ Florence raised an eyebrow.

  Laura studied the menu again. ‘I’m starving,’ she said. ‘I’ve got to eat something before I pass out or just make a total fool of myself. I’ll go and order for us. By the way, what do you think of the barman?’

  Ella tried not to meet Florence’s eye. They both worried about Laura. She seemed to have this internal heat-seeking device that could home in on a completely unsuitable man in five seconds flat.

  ‘I think, my love,’ said Laura, reaching over Ella and patting Laura’s arm, ‘that he’s a professional bloody flirt. I think that there might be slightly more suitable candidates here that you could choose.’

  ‘Like where?’ said Laura. ‘Because I don’t see any.’

  They all surveyed the room.

  Ella looked through Laura’s eyes at the cluster of young guys by the bar, the booth of suited office workers who immediately turned their heads in their direction.

  ‘Oh, God. Don’t make eye contact,’ Florence said.

  Over in the corner was a glossy, white grand piano around which a hen party – women with pink feather boas and rhinestoned T-shirts – were gathered. One of them started to dance a slow, drunken dance, holding her glass above her head. Two of the suited men got up and made their way over to her.

  Florence rolled her eyes. ‘OK. Point taken.’

  ‘How about him? Dark hair, leather jacket, over by the door?’ Ella stopped herself from pointing. They watched as the man crossed the floor to where a lovely young woman in a skimpy silver top was waiting for him.

  ‘Oh, God. She’s SO MUCH YOUNGER than him.’ Laura shook her head. ‘You see? You see what I mean? It’s impossible to meet anyone in a bar. They’re all either complete tossers or already with someone. Not exactly daddy material.’ She took another gulp of wine. ‘I may as well just get drunk. I mean, what’s the point?’

  Ella heard herself making soothing noises. But it was true. There was a thought that had been growing in the back of her mind, a horrible thought, all dark and jagged, and now with the wine, it was getting bigger all the time that she sat here. What if Billy left her, like Laura’s husband had done? Would she ever find anyone else? In a couple of years’ time she’d be thirty, like Laura. And Laura was right. Who was interested in a permanently exhausted woman in her thirties with young children, bills to pay and everything getting a bit, well, droopy?

  It wasn’t right. It was completely bloody unfair, of course. But it was how it was, how things worked.

  ‘What about internet dating?’ Florence’s voice was artificially bright.

  Laura pulled a face. ‘You wouldn’t know,’ she said. ‘You haven’t had to do it. They all lie about their age. They’re all looking for sixteen-to-twenty-five-year-olds. It’s . . . a nightmare.’

  Ella’s phone flashed. She pounced on it, eagerly. A text. From Billy.

  All fine here. G in bed no problem. Don’t worry. Hope you’re having fun. Love you xxx

  ‘Everything OK?’ Laura looked concerned.

  ‘Yes. More than.’ Ella was immediately flooded with guilt. She was being ridiculous. Ridiculous and selfish.

  She turned to her friend. ‘You know, Laura, you are so lovely. Beautiful and funny and . . . and clever and kind. And you’re a great mum. And one day soon someone’s going to come along who really bloody values that. Someone who actually deserves you.’

  Florence raised her glass. ‘I’ll drink to that,’ she said.

  12

  To remove obstacles: At the crossing of three roads, take a small handful of dirt and put it in your pocket. Leave at once and do not look back.

  – Miss Mary’s Book of Dreams

  ‘Best ’shrooming ever.’ Billy set the carrier bag carefully on the kitchen table. ‘We found absolutely loads this year.’

  ‘Chanterelles!’ Ella turned one admiringly on her palm. ‘Look, Grace. What’s this that Daddy’s brought home?’

  She held her hand out for Grace to see – the creamy dome, the fluted undersides, the frilled edges. If it wasn’t for the crumbs of soil clinging to the stem, she thought, you’d think that it was something from under the sea. You could imagine its rubbery shape opening and closing like a mouth.

  Grace prodded at it with a fingertip and then shrugged and turned back to her toy cars.

  ‘She’s unimpressed by my treasure,’ said Billy, pretending to look hurt. ‘Seriously, El. The woods are full of them this year. I’ve never seen anything like it. A real bumper crop.’

  Ella hung over the carrier bag and breathed. There was the scent of loam, tangled tree roots, secrets.

  ‘One risotto extraordinario coming up, then,’ she said, taking out their biggest pan, setting it on the stove.

  As she boiled water and chopped onions and celery, Billy sat at the kitchen table, sipping at a glass of red wine.

  ‘It was quite an afternoon,’ he said. ‘Selena knows just about everything it’s possible to know about mushrooms. Like a walking mushroom-pickers’ field guide, she was. Told me that her grandmother used to cook up chanterelles to make some kind of poultice, that she claimed they had antibiotic properties. I thought of you and your new interest.’ He winked at her over the rim of his wine glass.

  ‘Selena?’ Ella tried to keep the surprise out of her voice.

  ‘Yeah, she loves that kind of thing.’ Billy swirled the wine around his glass.

  ‘I didn’t realise she was going to be there. I wouldn’t have thought it was her scene. She looks . . . well, more sophisticated.’

  Billy raised an eyebrow. ‘I didn’t know you’d ever met her?’

  Ella felt her face flush.

  ‘Yes, I – um . . .’ She nodded over to the window. ‘The other day. When you had your symposium thingy in the shop. I was standing at the sink. I saw her waiting.’

  Billy smiled. ‘Right. Well, yes, I suppose she does come across a bit like that, doesn’t she? And believe me, at work she takes no prisoners. But she has a much softer side as well. She’s much gentler, once you get to know her better.’

  ‘Really?’ Ella felt that contraction in her chest again, as if someone had taken her heart and squeezed it. She turned back to the stove and continued to stir.

  She thought of Selena LaSalle, her long, blonde hair blowing around her face, the way that her pert little bottom would have looked, encased in denim – designer, probably – as she strode through the
woods ahead of Billy.

  She took a mouthful of wine from her glass, rolling the velvety texture of grape skins around on her tongue, then threw a ladleful of stock into the pan, listening for the fizz against the hot metal, moving the wooden spoon in circles. Usually, she loved Sundays like this one, winter rubbing itself against the darkening windows and the three of them held close inside the kitchen’s glow. But now it was as if something alien had crept in, sidling between the lazy heat of the stove and the wine tilting ruby-red in Billy’s hand. A false note. A glimpse of something half seen. Those words: sophisticated, softer, gentler . . . What was he doing, getting to know Selena better? She hated herself for the envy she felt spreading under her ribs. People were wrong about envy, she thought. It wasn’t green. At least, this feeling wasn’t. It was a dirty yellow colour.

  As they sat and ate, Billy splashing more wine into her glass and mumbling appreciative noises through each mouthful, she felt that something had changed. The little flashes of instinct she’d been having. Maybe they weren’t just a product of her overactive imagination, after all. Maybe she really couldn’t ignore them any longer. This was how things started, wasn’t it? Affairs. Infidelities. One person too preoccupied or self-absorbed, looking the other way; the other finding novelty in someone else, in getting to know them.

  ‘You know, Billy, I wouldn’t have minded going ’shrooming with you. I’d have quite liked it, in fact.’ She held a spoonful of the rice and mushroom mixture on her tongue and felt a wave of sadness flow through her.

  ‘Really? You would? Sorry, El. I never thought. Actually, I didn’t realise it was going to be so good this year. So many people. I thought it would just be a few old blokes and me. Usually is.’

  Ella concentrated on chewing. Inside her mouth, there was a quiver of excitement that she could feel distinctively as Billy’s. It was as if his eagerness had rubbed off on his fingers as he gently pulled the mushrooms from the ground. There was a faint tang of old leaves and then a slightly metallic taste that she remembered from way back in her childhood, when she used to stand outside and catch raindrops on her tongue. And something beneath that, too. Small, dry granules. If she had a word for it, it would be something like longing.

  She saw, in her mind’s eye, a mushroom growing in the dark earth, speeded up as if on one of those time-lapse films, its pale mouth reaching hungrily for the light.

  She saw Billy taking a mushroom from Selena’s perfectly manicured hand, a flicker of thinly disguised desire passing between their fingers.

  ‘Is it OK?’ she said. ‘This risotto, I mean. I think it tastes a bit overdone.’

  ‘Delicious.’ Billy laid down his fork with a satisfied sigh, smiling at Grace who was determinedly spooning rice between her lips and scattering it onto the table. ‘Delicious, Gracie, no? Mummy’s excelled herself, I’d say. I think I’ll help myself to a bit more, if that’s OK?’

  ‘Of course.’ Ella waved her fork. ‘It won’t keep.’

  What was wrong with her? It was crazy. The food cloyed in her mouth. It was as if she could separate out all the layers that had gone into growing those chanterelles – earth, rainstorms, sunlight. And then something else. Billy’s feelings?

  She remembered how Mamma always talked to the plants on her windowsill, whispered conversations of encouragement: Grow, little plant, grow. Reach for the sun. Drink it all up, that’s right. Her pots of basil and chives grew glossy and fragrant, their thick leaves lasting months, and she always claimed it was because of the words they soaked up with their daily watering. But this? This was something else. She’d never heard of anyone being able to taste emotions before.

  ‘Oh, Billy,’ she snapped. ‘Look at the mess you’ve made now. You’ve dropped it all over the top of the cooker.’ She sprang up from the table and scrubbed angrily at the sticky globules. ‘Why can’t you at least try not to be so clumsy all the time?’

  Later, when Billy had tucked Grace up in bed and lay sprawled across the sofa with the Sunday papers, Ella stood alone in front of the open fridge.

  First, she dug a spoon into a jar of peanut butter and lifted it to her mouth. Nothing. Next, she chewed on a slither of her favourite Manchego cheese. Clean grass dotted with tiny yellow flowers, a little breeze, scented with spring. She let the flavours separate on her tongue: the oak wood barrel where the curds had been kept, the creamy milk, still warm from the cow, the faintest whiff of an enamelled milk pail. But no emotion. Nothing.

  She wrapped up the cheese and thrust it back in the cheese box. What a total idiot she was. As if such a thing was actually possible, anyway.

  But she lay that night, listening to the rhythm of Billy’s breathing, going over and over things in her mind. It was true that she’d been neglectful recently, so wrapped up in her own struggle with herself that she hadn’t really noticed how Billy was feeling. Could she really blame him if he’d begun to look for some attention elsewhere? There’d been that late-night meeting last week. He’d come home a little worse for wear, saying he’d gone to the pub with the lads, had one pint too many. What if all the time he’d been with Take-No-Prisoners Selena? And what about the conference in Rome that was coming up in a couple of months’ time? Hadn’t he said that Selena was co-presenting something with him? That meant that they’d be staying in the same hotel for four days and three nights. Probably booked on the same flights. Was she right to be worried about that?

  The next morning, she was up at six, making porridge in the microwave, hesitantly lifting the spoon to her lips and tasting, with relief, the hot, fresh taste of the oats.

  ‘Morning, early bird.’ Billy put his arms around her as she stood at the sink, rinsing her bowl. ‘Sleep OK?’

  ‘Not really.’ Her skin under his fingers prickled with irritation.

  ‘Is there something on your mind, El?’

  She turned to look at him then, into his calm blue-grey eyes that were so like Grace’s. She nearly asked him. She wanted to come right out with it: Are you having an affair? But the words seemed too ridiculous to say out loud, too painfully needy. Just give it a bit longer, she thought. Chances are, it’s nothing at all. Something will happen, he’ll do something or say something and then I’ll know for sure that it was all just my imagination.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said, gently pushing his arms away. ‘Just tired. And I’m late opening up. Got a big delivery arriving today.’

  Billy frowned. ‘I’ve been thinking. Do you want to go out one evening this week? Just the two of us?’

  ‘You mean, like a date night?’

  Billy grinned. ‘I s’pose it would be, yes. But I think you need a break. I’d like to take you somewhere nice. And we could get my mum to babysit. In fact, we haven’t done that in ages, have we, El?’

  She shook her head. She could feel that black feeling opening up inside her again. She tried to swallow it down.

  ‘Yes. OK. I mean, I guess –’

  ‘You don’t seem very keen.’

  Billy was watching her, that worried look on his face.

  ‘No, it’s just. I’m being silly. I . . . God, just ignore me, OK? I’m ridiculous at the moment.’ She forced a laugh. How could she say that everything felt all wrong? That she was worried that he was just being extra thoughtful because he felt guilty? That she was too tired? That she didn’t have anything to wear? ‘Yes. OK.’ She arranged her face into a smile. ‘But what day, then?’

  ‘I’ll call my mum, sort something out.’ Billy grinned, bent to kiss Grace on the top of the head, took his work bag from the peg on the back of the kitchen door. ‘Right. Good. That’s settled. Date night.’

  *

  ‘I hated it.’ Kate flung the paperback onto the table in front of her. ‘Absolutely hated it. What is it with this Christa woman? She was so damn passive, so irritating. I just wanted to take her by the shoulders, tell her to get a grip, take control of her goddamn life.’

  Beside her, Ella felt Florence bristle. She and Kate usually clashed over the
books. But it was Laura who spoke first.

  ‘I think that’s a bit harsh. I mean, she’d doing her best. It’s really hard for her. She’s all on her own with all those children in the middle of nowhere, this man has been an absolute pig to her, quite frankly . . . So what’s she supposed to do? Just suddenly go out and grab herself a pair of high heels and some high-powered job? How? It’s not actually that easy. Who’d look after the baby?’

  At the sound of Laura’s voice, Harry woke up and started to cry. Laura coloured. ‘Shush, now,’ she said, bouncing him up and down in her arms. ‘Shush.’

  ‘Well, look, I didn’t mean –’ Kate shrugged.

  ‘No, I agree,’ Florence cut in. ‘I think the story works precisely because we see how difficult it is for Christa. How trapped she is. It speaks to so many women’s lives. It’s – complicated.’

  ‘And what about Emma?’ Sarah thumbed through her copy, looking for the right page. ‘You know, I really love that bit where – does anyone remember the bit I mean? – where Emma is looking out of the window and she sees Christa, pushing her buggy down the street, and she thinks that she should go and say “hello” but she feels like she can’t. I thought that was so well done. Such beautiful writing. How we can feel like it’s just too much distance to cross between our own life and someone else’s. How we’re all having the same experiences and yet we’re afraid to share that and so we end up feeling completely isolated.’

  Ella found herself nodding. She glanced over at Grace and Alfie, who were playing happily in the Children’s Corner. They each had police helmets on. Grace’s had slipped endearingly over one eye.

  ‘But I suppose I hated the way that Christa just lets this woman walk all over her.’ Kate shook her head. ‘She basically swoops in and steals her husband, her life . . . everything. And Christa doesn’t actually do anything. So I found it hard to feel much sympathy for her. I wanted her to at least fight for it.’