by Sarah Mason
No, we bloody couldn't.
But after a few days the grief really took hold. I couldn't quite believe this man I thought I knew, slept with on a regular basis, shared countless things with, even thought I might marry one day, was not the man I thought he was at all. At what point in our relationship had he changed so much? And why hadn't I seen it? It was all just too big for me to handle. So I did the only thing a young woman in my position could do. I ran away.
Of course, I didn't call it that at the time. Getting away, I think I said it was. Time to think, to reflect on my next move. I had a marvelous fantasy of how Seth, desperate to track me down, would come to my parents' house, beg and plead to see me, only to be told that I had gone abroad and couldn't be got hold of. It was such a brilliant idea that one week later I found myself on a plane to Singapore. Of course, for the next few weeks when I realized Seth wasn't coming anywhere near me, I wept down the phone to my mother from far-flung places, but eventually I started to be able to reconcile myself to the facts. Thankfully the anger seems to have worked its way out and now I am left with simple resignation at my fate. That's not to say I wouldn't take a swing at Seth if I had the misfortune to come across him but I have generally gotten over the fact that I am going to have to start over from scratch as far as my career is concerned. Anyway, I worked for a while in Australia, celebrated two birthdays in Thailand and Hawaii respectively and then, after having been away for just over thirteen months, returned home a few weeks ago with a severely depressed Visa card in need of hospitalization. Hence my hasty job at Mr. Trevesky's café in Tintagel.
I pootle off down the country lanes to Tintagel. Although there is a distinct chill in the air, the sky is a clear blue so I wind down my window and breathe in the smell of the damp hedgerows. Dinky little signposts mark the routes to various villages: Trebarwith, Polzeath, Pendogget. “By Tre, Pol and Pen, you will know the Cornish men.” The little rhyme repeats itself in my head as I get tantalizing glimpses of the sea through the farmers' gateways. The pace of life is so much slower down here in Cornwall, which is probably a good thing as most of the time you're sitting behind a tractor while the farmer decides to chat to the cows for half an hour.
As I am sitting behind one of the aforementioned tractors, I start to think that I really ought to start to consider what I am going to do next. Although waitressing at the café is an extremely worthy vocation, it's definitely not something I want to do for the rest of my life. I've already been through one pair of flip-flops for one thing. And as much as I love my family, I really would like a place of my own, free from sardine-eating seagulls and suchlike. The vague thought of another man some time in the future has also flitted through the inner recesses of my mind, but only flitted. I have been left with a deep distrust of men, but worse than that I have been left with an even deeper distrust of my own judgment.
One look at my watch tells me that Mr. Trevesky probably hasn't got to grips with the whole slower pace of life theory yet and so I overtake the tractor by accelerating to G-force on a small inlet and arrive in Tintagel in about ten minutes. As it's still relatively early, the small town hasn't quite woken up yet and I park easily in one of the hilltop car parks, normally so overcrowded that you can't move. I spend a couple of seconds gazing at King Arthur's castle, thinking, as always, how marvelously romantic it looks, quickly followed by how unsatisfactory their lavatorial arrangements must have been. I sigh to myself, grab my bag off the backseat and then make my way down toward the café.
By the end of the day I have only mixed up three of the side orders. A new record, I think, for me. One mashed potato, a salad and a chips (or French fries as Mr. Trevesky likes to call them, because Clemmie we are not that sort of café. Rick Stein has an awful lot to answer for) and I have managed not to go the wrong way through the kitchen doors. Wayne has been playing up to Mr. Trevesky and giving me a deliberately wide berth while protectively clutching his nose, which just makes me want to bash him on it with my tray.
The day has been quiet and I suddenly realize it's Friday which is changeover day for the tourists. And Friday means Sam and Charlotte are coming to supper tonight. Damn.
Sally accepted my mother's invitation to the same supper with great alacrity at the rehearsal the other night so there is no way I can get out of it. At least Barney will be there too.
As soon as I reach home, I run upstairs to have a bath and wash my hair. For some reason I always seem to get food in it. The last time Sam was here he kept picking out bits of carrot, sparking much hilarity for everyone except me.
I feel better after a splash about. I make a vague attempt to dry my hair but it's so thick that it takes me about half an hour and I tend to lose interest halfway through. It's quite long and sits just below my shoulders and adamantly refuses to do anything I ask of it. It has a rather wild, untamed look and my mother likes to refer to it as a mop. I'm dark blonde but add streaks of light blonde now and then. Of course, since I've returned from my trip abroad I haven't had to do anything because the sun had taken care of it. I just wish the freckles would go.
I wander downstairs with still-wet hair to see if I can help my father in the kitchen. It is supremely comforting to watch my father at work. My mother tends to make huge dramas out of making baked beans on toast. There are fire extinguishers everywhere in our house because something inevitably catches light and my mother runs around shrieking “Shit McGregor!” at the top of her voice, which is her very annoying catchphrase and has something to do with a Scotsman, a loch and a boat. But please don't ask her about it. She then has to partake of a couple of slugs of the cooking sherry and have a long lie down on the sofa.
My father is calmly pounding spices with a pestle and mortar at the kitchen table, a glass of white wine by his side. No curry sauces from Sainsbury's for him. I take over the pestle and mortar and the white wine. “Where's my mother?” I ask.
“It would be too much to hope that she's handing Norman back to the arms of Mother Nature, although Mother Nature would almost certainly refuse him, so I think she's gone down to the off license.”
“Bloody Sam. She always spoils him,” I grumble.
“Now, think of Sam as Norman the seagull.”
I stare at him doubtfully. My father likes Sam so I can't quite see where he's going with this. “Large and smelly?”
“No. He is in need of a home.”
“And my mother likes him more than the rest of us?”
“Er, no. Just that he is in need of a home.”
“But Sam doesn't like sardines.”
“No, I didn't say he did.”
“Can we release him back into the wild?”
“Clemmie, I think we've gone as far as we can go with the Norman metaphor.”
“I'm going to tell Sam that you said he smelled like Norman.”
My father opens his mouth to say something else and then smiles when he realizes I'm joking. “God, I hate that bloody seagull,” he says and takes a huge slug of my wine.
Sam arrives first, bearing two bottles of wine, and lets himself in through the back door. By this time I am sat on the table with my second glass of wine, talking to my father about the joys of French fries. We can talk for hours about the stupidest things.
My father gives Sam's shoulder a friendly squeeze. I wave at him; we find it quite difficult to know how to greet each other. If you have known someone since the age of fourteen, when both sexes are extremely jumpy about this physical contact malarkey, you're sort of left with the residues.
Sam helps himself to a bottle of beer from the fridge and comes to sit next to me at the table. He's changed out of his usual suit and is wearing faded jeans and a thin jumper pushed up at the sleeves.
“So, my young whippersnapper, how has your day been?”
“Well, I only mixed up three side orders but Friday's a slow day.”
“How's Wayne's nose?”
“Broken, I hope.”
“They are pretty confusing, those kitche
n doors.” He nods thoughtfully and then takes a swig of beer. I am about to agree wholeheartedly with him but he hasn't quite finished. “Imagine, two different sets with IN and OUT written on them. I can see how you could get them mixed up.”
My father guffaws into his wine while I purse my lips and glare at a grinning Sam. “Sorry,” he says. “But you must admit that it's quite funny.”
Er, no. Not from where I'm sitting because he clearly hasn't had a half-hour lecture from Mr. Trevesky on the subject. This is the trouble with Sam and me. We start off okay but quickly degenerate into some sort of row.
“It's not as easy as you think it is,” I bristle.
“I used to wait tables too. Do you remember? That summer up at Fistral Beach.”
Bugger. Yes, he did. “But you and Barney just pissed about all day. Waiting tables has moved on a bit since about a decade ago.”
“Technological advances?”
“I bet you didn't have doors with IN and OUT on them.”
“No, you're right. Barney wouldn't have lasted very long if we had. But it didn't help that you and Holly used to spend your time putting in orders for fruit salad without any apple.”
“You used to pretend you didn't know us!”
“I think we quite wished we didn't.”
Sam and I grin at each other, united in our shared memories for a second.
“Your mother and I are so proud,” sighs my father. “Two of our children waiting tables.” He smacks his lips together, looks misty-eyed and we all laugh. This is done in his very charming, twinkly fashion and I know he is just kidding. I also know that if Sam had said the same thing I probably would have lamped him one.
“Barney said that Holly might be coming back for the weekend?”
“She's arriving tomorrow morning,” I confirm and Sam looks delighted at this piece of news.
“How are she and James?”
“Good, I think. I spoke to her the other night. She needs a story.”
“Oh, she'll find one. Holly always lands on her feet, it's one of the things I love her for.”
“I love her for it too.” While at the same time feeling slightly grumpy about it. If Holly is the sister who falls on her feet then I am undoubtedly the sister who falls on her arse.
“How long is she down for?”
“A couple of days, then I'm going to go back to Bristol with her.”
“For how long?”
“Oh, just until the end of the week.”
“I bet Mr. Trevesky is glad to see the back of you.”
Talking of backsides. “Where's Charlotte?” I ask.
“Still stuck on the A39.”
“With her parents?”
“No, just her this weekend.”
“Getting pretty serious, Sam?” My father twinkles from over by the work counter. In fact he looks like he's crying. Would he be that upset at Sam leaving the fold? As I said, he is almost like a son to him. I peer a little closer. Oh. He's peeling onions.
“Serious enough, Patrick,” Sam smiles back.
My mother bursts through the back door in a pretty twirly dress (which would look awful on me), carrying what looks like the entire off license with Morgan trotting behind her. Sam immediately leaps up and rescues her from all the carrier bags. When freed from her load, she gives him a huge hug and a kiss. “Sam, so lovely to see you! God, I need a fag. Where's Charlotte?”
“On the A39,” we all chorus.
“Oh, that's too bad. Clemmie, darling, do you want to borrow a dress?”
“No, thanks. I'm fine as I am.”
My mother gives me the sort of look that tells me that she begs to differ but she wisely moves on. “I nearly ran over Barney coming up the hill.”
Just on cue, Barney comes panting through the door. “Thanks, Mum. You didn't think to give me a lift?”
“But darling, you were doing so well. I didn't want to interrupt your stride. Besides, I never stop on hills because I don't really know where the handbrake is.” The last time she stopped on a hill she had to abandon the car and walk the rest of the way.
Sam and Barney do a manly slapping and handshake jobby. “Where's Charlotte?” Barney asks.
“On the A39,” I say again. Probably teaching it to say its vowels, I nearly add but manage to stop myself at the last minute.
“Barney, I'm just going to go to the fridge to get another beer,” says Sam. “Please don't hit me with a chair.”
“Ha ha.” This is Sam's favorite new joke—to check everything with Barney in case he decides to hit him with a chair. We think it's very funny.
Sam helps himself to a beer from the fridge, passes another to Barney and then Barney settles in his normal place on the Aga. I hustle Sam off the table, seconds after he has just sat back down on it, and start to throw some placemats and cutlery around. Sam takes the bunch of cutlery off me as I pick it out of the drawer. “Clemmie, I'll do that.”
I smile gratefully at him and join Barney at the Aga while Sam lays the table, arranging the knives and forks pedantically. I was just going to throw the pile into the middle and let people help themselves, but anyway.
The doorbell rings and my mother goes through to open it. It must be Charlotte rather than Sally because we can hear my mother going into overdrive with noisy greetings. The door to the kitchen is thrust open as though we're in Act I and a figure is bundled in.
“Darlings! Look who it is!” says my mother, who seems to have launched into her frightening Noël Coward mode which involves lots of eye-rolling and random emphasis on words. Honestly, it's like having the entire Royal Shakespeare Company on drugs and in your kitchen.
Charlotte is wearing a navy blue linen skirt with opaque blue tights and flat Gucci loafers. Her mousy brown hair is scraped off her face into a tight bun at the nape of her neck. She doesn't wear any makeup whatsoever and she could really do with her eyebrows being done. I can't fathom what Sam sees in her.
Sam had been leaning languidly against one of the units as she entered the room but has now sauntered over to kiss her. Barney has slipped off the Aga and my father has washed his hands and they are both waiting to greet their guest with a double London kiss. We normally do just one down here.
Charlotte hands over her gifts of wine and flowers to my mother.
“Charlotte, you really, really shouldn't have.” Yes, Charlotte, I wish you hadn't too because my mother will then bury her head into the bouquet to smell the flowers as I have seen her do many, many times on stage. I hope she calms down soon.
I move forward to kiss Charlotte dutifully. “How was your journey?” I inquire politely.
“Awful. Rally, rally awful. I don't know why they simply can't build a motorway.”
Because we're trying to stop dreadful weekenders like yourselves buying up half the county, I think to myself, but I am spared from having to make a response by a knock at the back door and the appearance of Sally.
Charlotte sits down at the table and looks nervously around her. She isn't terribly fond of my mother's menagerie of animals (Morgan always makes a delighted beeline for her). Sam goes about getting her a gin and tonic and Sally kisses all of the family hello.
“Is curry okay with you, Charlotte?” asks my father politely. “I'm afraid it's all I do.”
“Super, Mr. Colshannon. I simply love curry.”
“Please call me Patrick.”
“Patrick, then,” she gravely acquiesces.
“Sally?” he asks. “Okay for you too?”
Sally doesn't reply because her mouth is full of the Kettle Chips my mother has just opened but she makes suitable tummy rubbing motions.
“Charlotte, tell us all about your week,” says my mother.
Did she have to ask? Couldn't we have ignored basic good manners, just for once? Charlotte works in the actuarial department of a large insurance company which, in my mind, counts as another very large mark against her for being mind-bendingly dull. I don't really understand what she does although she
's already explained it to me in an actuarial-work-for-idiots tone of voice. I make a face at Sally. God, here we go.
“Well, it's actually been rally rather interesting . . .” I must have visibly slumped at this point because my father gives me a good kick on the shins which perks me up no end.
“Did I tell you that Clemmie used to work for an insurance company?” says Sam at the end of her Weekly Actuarial Bulletin.
“Clemmie? Rally?”
All eyes turn on me. “I did not work for an insurance company!” I say indignantly.
“Didn't you? My mistake,” says Sam calmly. “What exactly was it you did then?”
“I valued art.”
“For an insurance company?”
“Well, yes.”
“Oh, you're quite right. That's not working for an insurance company at all,” he says dryly.
“But you work in a café now, don't you, Clemmie?” This is clearly baffling Charlotte as she looks in confusion from Sam to me.
“Yes, I do,” I say with as much dignity as I can muster. “I'm just paying off a few debts from my trip while I look for another job.”
“Well, from the state of you when you got back from your trip at least we know you had a good time,” remarks Sam wryly.
“I've told you before. I caught a virus,” I say through clenched teeth.
“Do all viruses have Jack Daniels printed on them?”
“Darling, we nearly didn't recognize you when the British Airways steward pushed you out in that wheelchair.”
“I was ill.”
The actual truth is that I spent the last night of my trip having a few drinks with some friends, fell asleep in someone's room and then woke up to find I only had an hour before my plane left. I had to pack in the taxi on the way to the airport and then arrived to find a five-hour delay as well as a long lecture from the check-in staff. I turned up in England twenty-four hours later, after having caught some sort of virus en route and losing one of my shoes. Things haven't been going any better since. I choose not to enlarge on the disaster that is my life thus far and luckily Charlotte doesn't ask any more questions because my father leaps in hastily with a few of his own.