by Isla Dewar
Marlon strode away from her. ‘This is crap. You and Richard are in love and I can’t take my spice rack home.’
Anna bustled after him. ‘You’re wrong. We’ll talk to Richard. He’ll give you the spice rack to give to Marla. Then you and he can start making something new. A chair or something.’
Marlon strode on. ‘I hate chairs. I don’t want a chair.’
‘Okay. But let’s go home and talk about this. We’ll put books on my new shelves and have hot chocolate and biscuits and everything will be fine.’
Marlon turned and glared. ‘Love’s rubbish.’
Anna’s heart went out to him. Oh, the pain of thinking your hero prefers another. She put her hands on his shoulders and looked him in the eye. ‘I so agree.’
*
On Friday Richard picked Anna up and together they went to the small community hall where a local quartet were playing Schubert. The seats were uncomfortable. They didn’t complain. Anna was becoming used to discovering neighbourhood goings-on that she’d had no idea about. ‘I always fancied being in a string quartet,’ she told Richard. ‘I loved the notion of meeting once a week in a beautiful living room with a piano and a luxurious sofa and bay windows. We’d sit in a friendly circle and play together.’
‘What do you play?’ asked Richard.
‘Nothing. That’s why I couldn’t do it. It was wishful thinking.’
Richard said, ‘Ah. Of course. Wishful thinking, I’d forgotten about that.’
The quartet clambered onto the little stage, took their seats and placed their music on the stands in front of them. Anna, Richard and the audience clapped. Two of the players gave a small friendly flicker of their fingers to Richard.
‘You know them?’ asked Anna.
‘Oh yes. Violin and viola players have wonky doors, rattling windows and creaking floorboards like the rest of us.’
Afterwards he said, ‘“Death and the Maiden”. Lovely. Sad he was ill at the time he wrote it but funny how sad music can cheer you up. Emotions are weird. Did you enjoy it?’
‘Yes,’ said Anna. In fact, she didn’t really know. She hadn’t been listening. She’d loved sitting next to Richard but her thoughts had been miles away. The music had made her reflective.
That morning, while moving books onto their new bookcase, she’d come across a book about motherhood she hadn’t known she had. It had told her about women who’d had children because they’d thought that was what women did. They hadn’t known how to cope with not wanting to be a mother. She’d been sitting reading this and had looked up. Sun was streaming in through the open door of her living room, dust motes dancing in the light. ‘It wasn’t that my mother didn’t want me. She just didn’t want to be a mother. Of course.’ She cursed that she’d wasted a whack of her life recovering from her childhood. She should have put it behind her and forgotten it. Her mother was a woman who didn’t want to be a mother; she’d wanted to be part of the world beyond the house. And why not?
Anna had gone into the kitchen, sat at the table, opened her notebook and written. Don’t blame your ma for your absurdities/She probably only wanted to be a concert pianist like you do/And aren’t.
Excellent. I’m getting better, she’d thought, and then went back to her bookcase.
‘Do you like Schubert?’ she asked as she and Richard walked round the corner to the Indian restaurant she hadn’t known about till now.
‘A bit. I prefer Bruce Springsteen. Music you can whistle and hum, and it’s more working-class,’ he said.
‘Still, you bought the tickets. Supporting your local string quartet.’
‘Actually, Lucy on the violin got locked out of her house and called me to open her door. I said I wouldn’t charge so she paid me with the tickets. I thought you’d like to go. You being a poet, I thought Schubert might be your guy.’
‘I, too, prefer Bruce Springsteen.’
‘Good man.’ He beamed approval and punched her lightly on the shoulder.
They drank beer with their curry. Richard accepted responsibility as Marlon’s hero and agreed to let him take the spice rack home and start a new project. ‘We could make a boat. I like boats.’
They ordered more beer. No matter if they drank too much. Richard wasn’t driving.
‘You want to talk about the kitchen?’ he asked.
‘Yes I do, and no, not really.’
‘Like that?’
‘Yes. I promised George I’d find the kitchen. Silly, but I needed to comfort her. Now you might have found it, I don’t know what to do. Do I go to the door of the house and ask to see their kitchen? Or maybe I should wait till they’re out and sneak round the back to look through the window. Then what? Tell George? And take her to go to the door and ask to see the kitchen?’
‘Tricky,’ said Richard.
The beer made Anna lightheaded. ‘I love her. But now I see her slipping back into the place I’ve been for years, worrying about the past, while I am finally moving forward and making a way for myself. Caring for Marlon. Visiting you. Having neighbours I actually know. I am doing things ordinary normal people do.’
Richard patted her hand. Ordered more beer. ‘It’s hard.’
Anna nodded. ‘She’s not just my best friend. For years she was my only friend. She listened to my woes. Encouraged me. Supported me when I read my poem to the people on the bus and walked home with me when we got thrown off for being a public menace. What a friend. I don’t deserve her.’
30
You Will Stop Living the Life You Imagine
‘I have walked out on my home and family twice,’ said George.
‘I didn’t know that.’ Anna was surprised.
They were having lunch in George’s garden. As it was her turn to provide the food, Anna had brought sandwiches, cake and a bottle of wine.
‘Bagels,’ said George. ‘I didn’t know you knew about bagels.’ Now George was surprised. She hadn’t been well recently and didn’t feel like driving to any of Anna’s sandwich spots.
‘I knew about them. I didn’t bother to try them till I looked up sandwiches in a cookbook I borrowed from the library. This sandwich is smoked mackerel mashed up with slices of pickled pepper and onion and cream cheese.’
‘I can’t believe it. You are moving on from a diet of beans, then?’
‘Indeed,’ said Anna. ‘Richard suggested the wine. He knows about such things.’
George raised her glass. ‘Thank you, Richard.’
‘So you walked out twice. How cool you are. Tell me.’
‘The first time doesn’t really count. I was only gone ten minutes and nobody noticed.’ She smiled. ‘I’d just had enough. It was a this-is-not-what-I-planned moment, you know?’
In fact, Anna didn’t know. Her whole life was not what she’d planned. It didn’t come in moments.
‘I was cooking supper. The television was on, music was roaring from somewhere upstairs, the radio was blaring. Two children arguing. Frank paying no attention to anything, talking to a client on the phone. Me yelling for someone to set the table and nobody listening or caring. So I walked out wearing my apron and carrying the frying pan full of sausages. I stumped along the hall and out the front door, down the path and steamed along the street. I’d had enough.’
‘Why did you take the frying pan?’
‘I didn’t really notice I had it in my hand till I got to the corner. I realised I’d no money, no coat, nothing, and turned round and came home. Nobody noticed I’d gone. Sausages were nicely done, though. Perhaps a furious walk in the middle of cooking does something for them.’ She poured more wine.
‘And the second time?’
‘I got fed up of Frank and his affairs. I packed a case and stayed in a hotel. But I kept phoning home to check the children were cleaning their teeth and not living on crisps and Coke and Snickers bars. So I came home the next day to keep them on the healthy path.’
‘Not good at dramatic exits?’
George said, ‘No. Maybe one day
I’ll get it right.’
‘I’ve never walked out on anyone. Nobody to walk out on.’
‘Many would envy that.’
They ate in silence. Anna wanted to tell George about finding the house where the kitchen was taken but wanted to know if it was still there before she said anything. She didn’t want George to be disappointed. She was also chasing a moment of glory in which she could show George the thing she longed to see again. Anna imagined the pair of them sweeping into the kitchen and her opening her arms – ‘Look what I’ve found!’ – and George swooning with joy. She wanted her friend’s praise and adoration.
*
The day before, she’d gone to the house and stood outside staring at it for half an hour, willing herself to ring the doorbell and ask to be invited in. Richard had told her that the house hadn’t changed hands since Cobb bought it more than sixty years ago. He was sure Cobb’s daughter lived there now. Anna imagined a Miss Havisham creature wandering huge, cobweb-draped rooms staring hopelessly at layers of dust in an ancient wedding dress. It was too much to contemplate. She went home.
In the evening Richard had turned up and suggested he take her to the house. ‘You can have a look at it. See if you want to go in.’ She didn’t like to say she’d already been to spy on it, so she sat in the passenger seat of his car and let him drive her back there. The house was still and silent. Three graceful storeys, with shuttered windows on the ground floor. There were trimmed bay trees either side of a glistening black door. Pot plants seethed to the ground in a small paved area and heavy black gates stood in front of a large double garage. ‘Posh,’ said Anna.
‘Out of my league,’ said Richard. ‘You want to knock on the door?’
‘There’s a bell-pull but I’m too in awe to use it. I have to make a weird request. I’m not up to it. To tell the truth, I’m scared.’
‘Understandable,’ said Richard.
They continued to sit and stare. At nine o’clock a car drew up and parked outside the gates. A woman got out. She was thirtyish, small with dark hair gathered into a bun at the back of her head. She wore a smart black business suit and a crisp white shirt.
‘Not Miss Havisham, then,’ said Anna.
‘Too smartly dressed for that,’ Richard agreed. ‘Is that what you imagined?’
‘I’d hoped for someone a bit deranged – so I wouldn’t appear too deranged myself.’
The woman opened the gates. She brought a small remote control from her jacket pocket and used it to open the garage doors. Back in the car, she drove in, parked, and then walked out of the garage, pausing to shut the doors. When she was closing the gates, she stopped and looked across at Anna and Richard. For a fretful moment they thought she was going to come across to them. But she didn’t. She fished a key from her bag, opened the front door and disappeared inside.
‘You want to try now? You know there’s somebody in.’
‘No,’ said Anna. ‘She looks important and busy. I want to go away and soothe myself with rock and roll and alcohol.’
*
George finished her sandwich, dusted crumbs from her shirt and said, ‘James has gone. I think he’ll be the last. I don’t see Lola or Emma coming back.’
‘Where has he gone?’
‘He’s got a house with three bedrooms and a garden. What I hate is his leaving and me having to get used to it all over again. Three times that man, my son, has done that to me. First when he went to university. Second when he came home from university and stayed with us for a couple of years till he earned enough to pay for a place on his own. Then now. It’s awful.’ She leaned back, stared at a hollyhock and added, ‘He has become a family man. He’s gone all broody. His new partner has a child. He wants more. I’m glad he seems to be settled. I can die now.’
‘You’re not going to, are you?’
‘It isn’t on my to-do list. But I won’t mind if it happens. My children are sorted. Emma is fine. Lola is Lola, and has always known who she is and what she wants. And now James has come to terms with being a grown-up. My work is done. Who knows, I might see Willy again. My little love.’ This thought seemed to please her. ‘My children don’t really know me. Well, Lola perhaps has seen my naughty side from time to time. But mostly children only come along when you’re settled. They’re not aware of the emotional turbulence and absurdity and alcohol and sly sex you indulged in before they came along.’ She laughed. ‘You have to smile when they look at you and accuse you of being boring.’
She poured another glass. ‘I want Leonard Cohen played at my funeral and Nina Simone singing “Feelin’ Good”. And a party afterwards. I’d like to go to it but for obvious reasons that won’t be possible.’
Anna said that she hadn’t thought about her death. ‘It doesn’t matter really. When I’m dead, I’ll be dead and I won’t care about anything. I just hope I haven’t paid a huge bill before it happens.’ She looked about her at the garden. ‘I wish I’d done something like this. It’s amazing here. I’m in awe.’
It was beautiful. There was a small area of grass, complete with a table and chairs. This was under a pergola crammed with climbing blue and white clematis and roses. The rest was flowers. George planted them and gave them their orders. ‘Grow. Grow. Grow.’ And they did. They didn’t dare not to. Blues, reds, scarlets, pinks and whites and yellows, all shoving and bustling towards the sky and flooding the air with scent.
‘You’ve done all this. I can hardly believe it. I have done nothing really,’ said Anna.
‘Children. Oh God, I love them but I had to be safe and sane for them. I became a little mundane. I put my wildness into this.’ She spread her arms and took a little bow. ‘Here’s my garden. But your time is coming. Some people blossom late. You will stop trying to have the life you imagine and start having the life you have, and you will be happy. How odd I have reached an end and you are just beginning.’
31
George’s Kitchen
It took four visits to the Cobb house before Anna worked up the courage to pull the bell. Visiting up to this point had meant staring at the front door and imagining what was behind it. She had worked on a small speech she planned to give when she finally stood before whoever opened that door to her.
It was Grace Cobb, the woman she and Richard had watched the week before. She looked Anna over so critically that Anna forgot what she had to say.
‘It’s you,’ Grace said. ‘You’ve been hanging around here. What do you want?’
Anna opened her mouth but nothing came out.
‘I was thinking of calling the police. I thought you might be planning a robbery.’
Anna shook her head. ‘Me? Really?’
Grace looked her up and down, a slow scathing perusal. ‘No. I suppose not.’ She was dressed for relaxing – thin cotton wide-checked trousers and a T-shirt with LOVE printed on the front. Flip-flops on her feet. Yet somehow she looked stylish.
Some people just do, Anna thought. Not me, though.
‘Could I look at your kitchen?’ she asked.
Grace said, ‘Huh?’
‘I think your kitchen was designed by my friend’s husband. I think it was dismantled from a flat in the High Street and brought here.’
Grace said nothing. Her face was without expression.
‘Please,’ said Anna. ‘I promised my friend I’d find it. I think she needs to see it again.’
‘They weren’t paying the rent,’ said Grace.
‘My friend didn’t know that. She was very young.’ Anna met the critical glare. She thought, So she knows. The kitchen is here. ‘Please,’ she said again.
Grace stepped back and opened the door wide enough for Anna to step through. She pointed down the hall. ‘First door on the right.’
The hall was lined with framed pictures floor-to-ceiling. Anna wished she could stop and look at them. The floor was highly polished old wood. The whole house smelled of scented candle. And Anna was nervous. She felt she had no right to be there.
T
he kitchen took her breath away. It wasn’t just that it was beautiful; it was also that this room had marked the beginnings of George. This was where George had decided not to go home, because she’d found it too alluring to leave. This was where she’d spent time being loved and loving back. This was where she’d discovered who she was. For a moment Anna knew what it was like to be George, her best friend. It was almost too much information. She felt she had stepped into a place she wasn’t meant to be.
‘It’s lovely,’ she said.
Grace said, ‘Yes. A good thing as I’m not allowed to change it. My grandfather left me this house on condition that the kitchen remained as it is.’
‘Would you like to change it?’
‘I like to make my mark. But I don’t mind leaving this room as it is. I don’t cook. My boyfriend does and he loves preparing meals in here.’
‘Is this exactly how it was?’ asked Anna.
Grace nodded. ‘I’ve added a microwave and an espresso machine. Like I said, I don’t cook so I heat stuff up and I love coffee. The original machine that’s still here is too old to use.’
Looking round Anna saw that the pots and pans, china and pictures enhanced the room. There was a large cooking range complete with deep-fat fryer along one wall. They were nononsense utility pieces that meant business. There was something pleasing and reassuring about them. In one corner was a floor-to-ceiling wine rack. Standing alone near it was a fifties-style American fridge. Three French-style pendant lights hung over the worktop opposite the cooking range. Either side of the lights hung rows of heavy copper pots.
‘The knives in the drawer are all original Sabatier carbon steel. Some are Japanese too,’ said Grace. She pointed to shelves. ‘Books – not all cookbooks. Records and a turntable. They loved music.’
Anna said, ‘I know.’ Looking at the space between the table and the work unit, she noted there was room to dance. ‘They’d have danced.’
On shelves beside the wine rack were a ceramic French coffee maker, white covered with blue flowers, a row of twenties soda syphons, an ancient coffee grinder, a nut cracker, a pottery stew pot and other antique kitchen gadgets. After taking them in, Anna turned to look at the pictures.