A Wedding at the Comfort Food Cafe

by Debbie Johnson

  ‘Anything other than a whistle pop?’

  ‘Well … not much more, to be honest. Lynnie insisted on cooking tonight, and made a lentil pie with sugar instead of salt. We all had to pretend to like it and secretly throw it away afterwards. Except Van – I think he actually liked it, the freak.’

  The background noise has died down, and I can tell he’s walked outside. I picture him standing there, by the fountain outside the main house, in the rapidly fading light.

  ‘I’ll come and get you,’ he says, ‘in about an hour. I’ll make sure the kids are all right, and I’ll see you then. Wrap up warm.’

  I agree, blow some kisses down the phone, and flop back down onto the bed. Obviously, being the very definition of contrary, my body decides that it’s now very very tired, and would quite like to go to sleep.

  I drag myself up, and into the shower, and into jeans and a T-shirt and a thick fluffy jumper with red and black horizontal stripes on it. It makes me look like a bumblebee that’s gone over to the dark side.

  When I wander through to the living room, Mum and Willow are both crashed out watching Wizards of Waverley Place. Mum’s developed this strange taste for teen TV shows since she’s been ill, and sadly she’s sucked us all into her evil world of cute kids who live on boats and sweetly dysfunctional families and cheerleaders and nerds.

  Lynnie looks up at me as I enter, and I see the quick momentary confusion flicker across her face. I reach up and touch my hair, pretending I’m tucking it behind my ears, and tonight at least, it’s enough. She sees and registers the red hair. She smiles, her eyes lighting up as she recognises me. It’s heartbreaking and lovely at the same time.

  ‘You look like Dennis the Menace, Auburn,’ she says, pointing at my sweater. ‘If he was transgender.’

  ‘Why thank you, Mother,’ I reply, giving her a little twirl. ‘That’s exactly what I was aiming for. I’m popping out for a bit with Finn, is that okay with you two?’

  Of course, what I actually mean is ‘Is that okay with you, Willow’, as she’ll be the one left with Mum. Van’s outside, in the VW camper van man-cave he calls home, so she’ll have help if she needs it – but it’s polite to ask. See how hard I’m working on being a good girl?

  Willow grins at me and nods. She looks bushed after a long day at the café, her slender limbs sprawled over both arms of the floral-printed chair, her pink hair gusting around her face. Bella Swan, her Border terrier, is curled up in a small wiry ball on her lap.

  ‘As long as you’re home before midnight,’ she says, stifling a yawn. ‘In case you turn into a pumpkin.’

  ‘Terrible story, that,’ interjects Lynnie, frowning in contempt. ‘Completely anti-feminist. What kind of a message does it send out to young girls, telling them they need a Prince Charming to rescue them, and that their sisters are ugly and evil? Patriarchal nonsense …’

  Willow and I share an amused look, and nod. Every now and then, the old Lynnie pops up and gives us a rant, the kind we grew up listening to, and it’s somehow very comforting. Our bedtime stories were never the bedtime stories that other little girls listened to.

  There’s a knock on the door, and I feel a quick surge in my heart rate. I’m like a giddy schoolgirl, which Lynnie wouldn’t approve of.

  She looks a bit surprised at the sound – visitors can be unnerving for her – and Willow quickly says: ‘Auburn, that must be Finn. Your poor boyfriend. Off you go, have fun!’

  We’ve got used to doing these subtle recaps for Lynnie’s benefit, finding ways to gently remind of her what’s happening around her so she doesn’t get frightened, without making her feel stupid.

  ‘Yes, have fun!’she adds, reassured that the knock on the door doesn’t represent any kind of threat to her or her loved ones. ‘Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!’

  As Lynnie has spent most of her life living on various artists’ communes, having affairs with much younger men, and raising three kids on her own, she’s something of a rule-breaker. I’m not sure there’s much I could do that Lynnie hasn’t done already.

  I sprint to the front door and unlock it. We have to keep everything locked in case Lynnie goes walkabout, which she did last year and almost died. It’s a pain, but not as much of a pain as searching the clifftops at four o’clock in the morning, looking for your mother.

  Finn is standing in the porch, all tall and gorgeous, and I fight to keep down a little squeal. Mine, all mine. Just seeing him knocks some of the strangeness of the day out of me, and makes me feel more human again.

  He’s wearing jeans and a black chunky-knit sweater, and looks like he could throw me in his longboat and take me away for a good ravishing and a smorgasbord.

  ‘Your carriage awaits,’ he says, pointing at his four-wheel drive. Huh. Weird – it’s almost as though he heard us earlier.

  ‘Patriarchal nonsense …’ I mutter, leaning up to give him a quick kiss on the cheek.

  ‘Nope,’ he replies, evenly, ‘a Toyota Land Cruiser.’

  I climb in and buckle up as he sits beside me and starts the engine.

  ‘Everything okay at home?’ he asks, glancing at me through his mirrors. Lynnie, when she knows who he is, adores Finn. She calls him her Angel of Light, and clearly imbues him with all kinds of spiritual goodness. When she doesn’t know him, though, it’s a different matter entirely.

  ‘Yes, fine,’ I reply quickly to reassure him. ‘I needed an escape route, that’s all. Thank you, Star Lord.’

  Star Lord was Tom’s nickname for the person he was recruiting to manage Briarwood, and it’s kind of stuck.

  ‘You do know, don’t you,’ I say, as he pulls out onto the road and heads off to destination unknown, ‘that you only got the job because of your name?’

  ‘What? Being called Finn was part of the job description, was it?’

  ‘No. I mean you got your job because your name has one syllable. Only men whose names have one syllable are allowed to live in Budbury.’

  I see him running through the men he knows here – Joe, Matt, Cal, Sam, Tom – and realising that it’s true.

  ‘But some of their names are shortened versions,’ he points out. ‘Wasn’t the other guy shortlisted called Simon? He could have been called Si.’

  ‘Ah yes, but you’re missing one very important point – I couldn’t have given the job to someone I had to call Si.’

  ‘Why’s that?’ he asks, his smile telling me he knows he has fallen into an evil trap but he doesn’t mind.

  ‘Because every time I was in a room with him, I’d have to dance around Gangam Style …’

  He pauses, then replies: ‘You do know that’s spelled P-S-Y, don’t you?’

  Huh. I didn’t, as a matter of fact. Bastard.

  ‘Thank you, Admiral of the Pedantic Fleet,’ I say, in a minor huff with myself for my lack of pop culture spelling knowledge. ‘Where are we off to, anyway?’

  ‘The cliffs near Durdle Door,’ he says. ‘For a picnic.’

  ‘Did you bring whistle pops?’

  ‘No. I brought salad.’

  ‘Uggh. Why would you do that to me?’

  ‘Because I’m me,’ he says, grinning. ‘And your body’s a temple. If it’s any consolation, I also brought Scotch eggs and blueberry muffins from the café.’

  ‘That’s all right then,’ I answer, already figuring out ways to pretend to eat salad without actually eating it.

  As it turns out, the salad was also from the café – Finn had been there earlier in the day and brought home some treats – and therefore it was delicious as well as healthy. Chunks of feta cheese and lots of olive oil and pine nuts make everything taste better.

  He’s spread out two zipped together sleeping bags on the ground, and laid various items of bodily sustenance across them. He’s found a spot a mile or so away from the famous Durdle, and the view is amazing. It’s properly dark now, the sky studded with stars, the only sound that of the sea rolling across the sand and the occasional rummaging of wildlife aroun
d us.

  We eat, and chat, and all seems well with the world. I feel blessed to live in such a beautiful place, and to be with such a beautiful man, and to eat such beautiful muffins.

  After we’ve had the picnic, he clears up, and we climb into the sleeping bags. It’s been another warm day, but it’s still spring and the night-time temperatures are not as friendly as they could be. I don’t mind – I’m only human and, aware as I am of patriarchal nonsense, being crammed into a sleeping bag with Finn is not my idea of oppression.

  He wraps me up in his arms, my head resting on his chest, and strokes my hair as we gaze up at the night sky.

  ‘This is nice,’ I say, burrowing into him even more. ‘We’re snuggling.’

  He laughs, and replies: ‘Snuggling. That’s not a word I associate with you, Auburn.’

  ‘Me neither! I don’t think I’ve ever used it before in a non-ironic way. Maybe I’ve used it to incorrectly describe the illegal activities of those who import goods while also bypassing customs tax …’

  ‘Would you call those trunks Daniel Craig wears in Casino Royale budgie snugglers then?’

  ‘I’d call them heavenly. You should get some. We could role-play Bond together. I could be your Pussy Galore.’

  He’s silent for a moment, and I know he’s thinking it through.

  ‘Yes,’ he says eventually. ‘I’d definitely be up for that. I’ve got a tux. We could flirt and drink martinis. Could I persuade you to be a sexy secretary with your hair up and glasses on, and call you Miss Moneypenny?’

  ‘Of course you could. I always thought she was very under-rated, Miss Moneypenny …’

  ‘Good. Now we’ve planned that out, how about you tell your very own 007 what’s bothering you? You sounded really off on the phone.’

  ‘Ah,’ I say, taking a deep breath and preparing to bare all. ‘That’s because I asked Tom to help me start divorce proceedings. Hopefully, I’ll soon be a single woman again. Well, not a married woman with a boyfriend, anyway. So, not single, but half as much more single again …’

  He stays silent when I say this, possibly waiting until I run out of steam, and I try not to freak out and over-react. It’s a big thing, and I know the way Finn works – he’ll process it before he speaks. He’s the anti-me.

  I feel his arms tighten around me, and he says: ‘That’s good. I’m pleased. Not just for me, but … for you. It seems like something you should do. You can’t leave the past behind if you’re still legally married to it.’

  ‘That’s exactly right. Plus, then you can start shopping for diamonds for me … kidding!’

  ‘I know you’re kidding. I wouldn’t get diamonds anyway. I’d get something unusual, like an emerald. If I was, in fact, planning on getting you anything at all.’

  We’re both feeling our way through this, keeping it light, both making the effort not to put a foot wrong. I kind of preferred it when we were snuggling and staring at the stars, but I had to tell him. It was stupid of me to hide the fact that I was married from him in the first place – and it’d be even stupider to hide the fact that I’m now in the process of becoming unmarried.

  ‘I’m glad you told me,’ he says, kissing the top of my head. ‘Are you ready to tell me about him? About what happened? Because I’m not thick, Auburn – you go pale and shaky every time the subject comes up, so I can see it still affects you. Maybe it’d be good to talk about it.’

  I’m not all together sure he’s right. I’ve survived perfectly well without talking about it for years now. Or … okay, not well. Kind of unwell, in many ways. It’s only this last year that I’ve started to feel okay again – thanks to Finn, and Willow, and the Budbury crew. Even though the reason for me coming home was a sad one, turns out it’s had some pretty good side effects.

  ‘I’ll try,’ I say, deciding that he is right after all. As usual. ‘But I might get lost halfway through, okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ he replies firmly. ‘Whatever you want. No pressure.’

  ‘Okay,’ I repeat, feeling him wrap one of his legs over me. ‘Well … I met Seb in a bar, which is not an unusual thing, I suppose. I mean, lots of people meet their partners in a bar, don’t they? But the difference with us was that we never left the bar. That bar, or other bars, or nightclubs, or parties. We were … wild. It felt like fun at the time – until it didn’t. Until I realised that all we did was drink, or go mad, or sleep. Literally everything we did together involved some kind of booze or stimulant, or a hangover. There was no in between. No normal.’

  ‘Right. I’ve had flings like that. Where once the adrenaline wears off, there’s not much left.’

  ‘You whack-a-moled the nail on the head there. Except this wasn’t a fling – I was married to him, and living with him, and we were really, really bad for each other. I mean, I think living like that even on your own would be bad. But if you had an other half who saw that, and helped you rein it in, or occasionally suggested going to the cinema instead of a rave, maybe it would level out. But with us, there was no levelling out – we were living 100 per cent switched on, all the time.’

  ‘So when did that start being a problem?’ he asks, gently. ‘Because I assume it did.’

  My mind is time-travelling me back to a time and a place I don’t want to go to: to Barcelona, all those years ago. To the time when I found out he was doing more than ecstasy and cocaine, and had started on heroin. To the time he locked me out of the flat for two days because he had friends around and forgot I existed. To the time his mother called me, saying he’d been taken to hospital with a suspected overdose. To the time – times, plural – he promised to clean up his act, always so convincing, but never managed.

  To all the highs and lows and big losses and tiny paper cuts of disappointment, and the slow, dripping erosion of respect – for him, and for myself.

  ‘Well, it was a lot of things,’ I tell Finn. ‘Lots and lots of things that happened. Bad things. He needed someone who wasn’t me in his life – someone more mature, less insane. Someone who could have helped him with his problems. But I was a borderline basket case myself – I was never as into drugs as he was, but let’s say I never went anywhere without an emergency hip flask of vodka, just in case.

  ‘I don’t blame him entirely. He was basically a nice guy with a lot of demons. He needed me to be his exorcist, and I was too busy trying to stop my own head from spinning around. So, things got worse and worse and worse … complete recklessness, punctuated by these cycles of attempts to live well. Except in our case, living well meant drinking our vodka with orange juice instead of straight. His parents hated me because they thought I was dragging him down … and maybe I was. Maybe he needed another mother, not a wife. He certainly didn’t need me. I did him no good at all.’

  I pause for a breather, and realise that I’m crying. Crying real tears of wetness, which is something I rarely do.

  ‘I don’t know why I’m crying!’ I say, frustrated with myself. ‘It was years ago, and it’s all over now!’

  Finn wipes away the tears, and replies: ‘Because it’s emotional. Because it still makes you feel sad, no matter how long ago it was. There’s no sell-by date on sadness.’

  It sounds so simple when he says it – and maybe it is. Maybe I should allow myself to be sad. For me, for Seb, for everything that happened.

  ‘No, there isn’t. And it does make me sad. It’s why I pretended it never happened, I’m such a coward. So, anyway … we were trapped in this spiral for ages. Then, I don’t know why, I started to notice that I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t happy with my life, with my husband, with the whole messy thing. I’ve always liked messy – but this was too much, even for me. So I started to try and control myself a bit. Now, this isn’t a Hollywood movie, so it’s not like I went along to AA and met some inspirational bloke who would’ve been played by Tom Hanks in the film or anything. I just … cut down on the drinking.

  ‘Of course, the less drunk I was, the more messy things looked. It’s like when you’
re the designated driver on a night out. By the end of it, it’s quite funny watching all the drunk people repeating themselves and slurring their words and trying to pretend they’re sober.’

  ‘Oh yes. I know it well. And it is funny – every now and then.’

  ‘Right. Every now and then. Except this was all the time. Twenty-four hours a day. And the less I joined in with our usual games, the more annoyed he got – I think maybe I wasn’t as much fun, but also it was a bit like holding up a mirror to him. He didn’t like what he saw, and it made him feel bad about himself, and feeling bad about himself made him drink more and do more drugs and look for even more ways to escape.’

  ‘So you recovering made him worse?’

  ‘Yep – really healthy relationship, wasn’t it? And then …’

  I pause, not wanting to carry on – but compelled to. Not only because he wants to know, but because I need to get some of this out of my system. Maybe it’s been silently poisoning me for all these years, strangling me from the inside out.

  So I breathe deep, and I tell him, in fits and starts and snuffles. Eventually, I get to the part where things crashed out of control. I tell him about the weekend that everything changed for good.

  I’d managed to persuade Seb, with the help of his mother, to come away with me. To get out of the city, away from his so-called friends and his easy supplies and his barfly life. To come with me down to the coast, to spend some time together. Together, without the ever-present third parties.

  It started well. He seemed to accept that what I was saying to him made sense – he seemed to mean it when he said he wanted to change. Then again, he always was convincing. His mum lent us her car, and we took off to a little village in the Costa Brava.

  It was a beautiful place, all rocky coves and small sandy bays – not completely unlike home. We stayed in a small guesthouse, away from any tourists or commercial zones, and at the beginning I was hopeful. We ate good food. We took long walks. We talked and talked and talked.