Tensions surface when we sit down later to eat and she says, as she spreads her napkin on her lap, ‘Now, about this fruit and vegetable malarkey.’
Oh God, here we go.
My mother thinks delivering fruit and vegetables to people is something akin to being a rag and bone man. I’ve tried to dress it up for her, using phrases like ‘filling a gap in the market’ and ‘great potential for future growth’. But my mother is not fooled. She can smell a common tradesman from a mile off.
She sees my frown. ‘I worry about you, that’s all.’
‘I’m managing fine, thanks.’ I add peas to the lamb chops on my plate. ‘I’m not sleeping on a park bench quite yet.’
‘Well, at least Jamie’s earning plenty.’
She must have caught something in my expression because she gives me a sharp look. ‘You are still together, aren’t you?’
I consider a bare-faced lie but my face would give me away.
‘No. We – er – split up.’
‘Oh.’ She puts down her cutlery and assesses me.
It’s the same look of sad disappointment she used to give my lovely Dad. No wonder he decided he’d had enough, got together with the wonderful Gloria and moved to Scotland.
Deep down, I’ve always blamed my mother for him walking out when I was twelve.
‘Was it your decision or Jamie’s?’
‘It was mutual,’ I lie. ‘We grew apart.’
‘So you’re all right?’
‘I’m fine.’
‘Are you going to sell the house?’
‘Definitely not.’
‘Well, it’s the obvious solution to your money problems.’
I grit my teeth. ‘Not to me it isn’t.’
She sighs at my waywardness. ‘What about going back into PR?’
I spoon potatoes onto my plate and she watches, momentarily distracted by the substantial amount of carbohydrate I’m about to digest.
I pile on some more.
‘We’re in a recession, Mother. Haven’t you heard?’ I say, tucking in with a gusto I’m not feeling. ‘Jobs are like gold dust.’
‘Ah, so you haven’t tried, then.’
I grit my teeth. ‘Well, I have, actually. But now I’m running this box scheme. That’s my job now.’
‘Betsy’s daughter is sitting her Bar exams next year.’
‘But what about her acne? Won’t her facial redness get in the way of her prospects?’ I know I’m being childish but I can’t help it.
My mother looks at me sadly as if she doesn’t know why she bothers.
‘The point is she’s doing something worthwhile with her education,’ she says with exaggerated patience. ‘What’s the point of a degree in English if all you’re doing is selling carrots?’
‘Gee, thanks for the support, Mum.’
‘I am being supportive. I want to stop you making a terrible mistake, that’s all. Do you know anything about growing vegetables for profit?’
I raise my eyes to the ceiling. ‘Of course I do.’
‘Yes, but have you done your research?’
I fling down my knife and fork. ‘Mum, do you really think I just woke up one day and thought, “Now, what can I do that will really annoy my mother? Ooh, I know, I’ll set up a box scheme and lose what little money I’ve already got?”’
She holds up her hands. ‘All right. All right. No need to shout.’
‘I’m not shouting. I’m just trying to make you see that I know what I’m doing.’
She doesn’t have to know that until a few weeks ago, I hadn’t even heard of the Soil Association.
I slump back in my seat. ‘Look, I’d be lying if I said I haven’t had a few dire moments over the past few months. What with Jamie leaving and having no money, trying for jobs, all the rejections. But I think I’ve turned a corner.’
She sighs and lays a hand on mine. She still wears the plain gold band my dad gave her nearly forty years ago. I notice she has the first signs of brown age spots; they will have given her sleepless nights, that’s for sure.
I’m surprised to find there’s a lump in my throat.
‘It’s been horrible,’ I admit.
‘I know,’ she says, and rubs my hand briskly. ‘What was that song they used to sing? Life’s gonna suck when you grow up.’
I nod. ‘Life’s a bitch then you die.’
We smile ruefully at each other, then she laughs and says, ‘Life’s a bitch then you marry one. That’s what your father used to say.’
‘I made a good profit this week. I’ll make business woman of the year yet.’
She smiles. ‘Here’s hoping.’
‘I know you think I should sell up, but Farthing Cottage belonged to Midge and I’m not giving it up without a fight.’
But this is a confidence too far.
My mother sighs and removes her hand. She’s never forgiven Midge for leaving the cottage to me.
‘Trifle?’ she says, rising to clear the plates.
The subject is closed.
Chapter Eleven
When my mother was born, my Aunt Midge was already eighteen with a place at teacher training college.
According to family folklore, a fanfare of rejoicing greeted my mother’s arrival. She was a source of endless enchantment to parents who had long ago accepted they would have only one child.
Pictures of my mother, Val, are mostly in colour and fill several bulging albums. Baby Val in a black perambulator, wrapped up against the winter chill in red coat and white bonnet. A giggling toddler with white-blonde curls, held aloft by her dad on a windy beach. Then there’s six-year-old Val in a cute, skirted bathing costume splashing about in the waves.
The pictures of my Aunt Midge – taken years earlier when cameras were more of a novelty – are mostly black and white. They show a brown-haired girl in plaits and a school hat looking confidently into the camera. There is self-possession in those dark eyes but also, I fancy, a kind of weary resignation, as if she’s already worked out that life is not for the faint-hearted.
I once asked Midge if she ever resented my mother’s surprise arrival. ‘Quite the contrary,’ she replied. ‘I had more freedom to be me after that.’
I asked her what she meant.
‘I was a tomboy,’ she explained. ‘Hated dolls and the fussy dresses my mother was always pressing me to wear. But Val turned out to be a real girly girl who loved pink and dressing up like a princess. That made your grandmother very happy.’
My mother has never lost her fondness for pretty clothes.
When I was growing up, I was fascinated by the elegant outfits she’d wear to her high-powered job as PA to a chief executive. Every morning at 7.45, she would pop her head round my bedroom door, all suited and lipsticked, to make sure I was awake. Still warm in bed, I would hear the clip of her heels on the parquet flooring downstairs as she checked her reflection in the hall mirror and gathered up her keys and bag, and then the sharp click of the front door closing. Dad made my breakfast and sent me off to school.
My mother was rarely home before seven in the evening. Working long hours meant life had to be fairly regimented. Housework was done on a Friday evening and the supermarket shop on a Saturday morning. My dad worked hard during the week in his job as a financial controller for a small local firm and he believed weekends were for relaxing. But my mother’s the sort of person who can’t rest if there’s a cushion out of place and I think it was this, more than anything else, which caused the friction between them.
With depressing regularity, my mother’s dissatisfaction at my dad not pulling his weight would boil over into a full-scale row and Sunday lunch would be a gloomy affair, my mother serving up roast chicken and peach melba with tight-lipped resentment and Dad attempting to lighten the atmosphere with humour. I would have to try really hard not to laugh at his jokes because that would mean I’d sided with Dad.
I was convinced they were going to get a divorce, like the parents of Mandy Snaith in my class at
school. And however difficult things got at home, I didn’t want that.
I remember very clearly Dad going off once and staying away for days, maybe even a week. It was probably after one of their rows. My mother went to bed in a major huff and refused to get out again. It was the one time I remember her having time off work.
For me, aged eleven, it felt like an adventure having to fend for myself. I ate jelly cubes and handfuls of cereal straight from the packet and went to bed when I felt like it.
The ice-cream van always came round on a Sunday – and that particular day, I went into my mother’s room and asked if I could have a Mr Whippy. She pointed to her bag and said, ‘Take my purse.’ So I did. But when I got to the van I couldn’t decide whether I wanted a Strawberry Mivvy or a Fab or a Twister. So I decided to have one of each. Wrapped in her bedroom bubble, my mother would never know.
I took the booty up to my bedroom and lay on my bed listening to Duran Duran on my tape deck and eating them all, one after the other. (Afterwards, I was sick and I haven’t felt the same about ice-cream since.)
Eventually Ruby, my mother’s friend from along the road, came in to look after me, making me meals like shepherd’s pie and toad in the hole, which was a real novelty because my mother never had time to make meals from scratch on weekdays.
Then Dad came back and things returned to normal.
With both parents working, the school holidays were a problem – especially the long, six-week summer vacation. But we got into a routine I was very happy with. On the first Saturday of the summer holidays, Mum and Dad would drive me down to Aunt Midge in Surrey and I’d tumble excitedly from the car at Farthing Cottage and feel that the holidays had really begun.
Midge, by that time retired from her career as a teacher, would be brown as a berry from spending so much time outdoors. She wore what my mother called ‘those awful slacks’ and when she hugged me, she’d smell of fresh air and lavender from the garden. We would have lunch and I’d watch my mother and my aunt trying to find topics of conversation in common and I’d marvel all over again at how they could possibly be sisters.
Midge made my mother uneasy. Mainly, I think, because Midge didn’t give two hoots about what anyone thought of her. Val in slacks was never going to happen.
While I was open-mouthed with admiration at Midge’s exploits, my mother’s response to news that her sister had decided to dye her hair maroon or provide sanctuary for neglected donkeys was rather less enthusiastic. Once, Midge went off to Peru with a man she’d met only the week before in the off-licence. (He was gay and mourning the loss of his long-time lover, she later explained. He needed cheering up.) The ladies my mother lunched with would have pursed their glossy lips with disdain had they known.
After the obligatory cup of tea, my mother would start to make noises about leaving. She and my dad would get in the car, and Midge and I would follow them down the drive and wave them off along the lane. Then we’d look at each other with a sort of guilty glee.
For me, from the age of about four until I was fifteen and started going on holiday with my friends, it meant six glorious weeks of freedom from the restrictions of home life. I could sleep late, see my friends in the village, graze on chaotic meals in Midge’s cosy kitchen, help her out in the garden and have long chats with her about anything and everything. No topic was out of bounds.
I could listen for hours to her talking about places like Venice and Rome and Santorini, and all the people she’d met on her travels. I especially liked hearing her talk about her visits to Venice.
I always remember she wore a brooch made of dark blue glass with a daisy pattern on it. Someone bought it for her in Venice, she said. It came from a special place called Murano where they made lots of lovely things with glass.
I had a feeling she met a man in Venice. I never asked her and she didn’t tell me, but there was a certain wistfulness in her eyes whenever she looked at the brooch.
She planned to take me to Venice one day.
I’ve reached the age of thirty-two and I still haven’t stood on the Rialto Bridge in Midge’s favourite city. I think I’m saving it. In my mind, Venice is the most special place in the world and deep down, I’m waiting to go with the right person.
Jamie and I had talked about a break there for my last birthday but it never materialised.
And in a strange way, I’m glad.
A railway carriage on a Sunday is not the best place to enjoy a good sulk.
Spending twenty-four hours with my mother has left me feeling wrung out.
I board the train, determined to get two seats to myself. And so far, my black dog aura seems to be bearing fruit. I’ve repelled two men with backpacks and a family of five just by being. One look at me hunched crossly into the window seat and they moved hastily on.
The guard blows his whistle and the train moves off.
Great, now I can spread out.
I chuck my coat onto the seat opposite, huddle back into my corner and shut my eyes. I’m fed up with being nice. I’m going to take a leaf out of Anna’s book and start saying exactly what’s on my mind. Glowering, I think dark thoughts to get me into character.
‘Excuse me. Is anyone sitting here?’
I open my eyes and a sweet-faced girl, with long, very fine dark hair that is probably the bane of her life, is smiling at me expectantly.
‘No. Go ahead,’ I say, reverting instantly to type and getting up to push my coat onto the overhead rack.
She and her boyfriend (he looks just like her except his hair is three inches shorter) bundle their luggage away and sit down opposite. She rests her head on his shoulder and they sit there, holding hands. Looking at me.
I could weep. Honestly, I could. Because how can I take off my shoes and slouch along two seats, eating egg sandwiches and crunching apples, with those two watching my every move? And even though our paths will never cross again, I still can’t move to a different seat because they will think I’m either very rude or a weirdo.
I’ve had an allergy to loved-up couples ever since I realised my Erik fantasies have been exactly that. Pure fantasy. Nearly three weeks have passed since he helped me with those first deliveries – and I’ve heard not a word from him.
My mobile rings just as I’m nodding off. It’s Jess, wanting to know what time my train gets in.
‘Why?’ I ask. ‘Do you want to come over later?’
She hesitates. ‘I can’t. We’ve earmarked today for choosing the wedding breakfast menu.’
‘Oh. Right.’ Does it take all day to decide between brandy snap baskets and fresh cream profiteroles?
‘Oh, by the way, Anna’s fed up because Peter’s sister, Josie, is getting married and he’s pressing Anna to go to the wedding with him,’ Jess tells me. ‘She’s doing her usual thing of holding him at arm’s length.’
I sigh. ‘Poor Peter.’
‘I know,’ says Jess. ‘She’ll lose him if she’s not careful.’
I come off the phone feeling slightly bemused by the call. I can normally read Jess like a book. She’s one of those beautifully transparent people who couldn’t dissemble even if she wanted to.
At last the train glides with a screech of brakes into King’s Cross. Gathering my belongings, I step into the dense crowd making its way to the barrier.
The train to Fieldstone leaves in six minutes.
I can see the departures board up ahead but we’re moving so slowly, we’ll be lucky to get there by next Tuesday. I try to squeeze through but several people turn and glare so I give up. Then my eye catches something odd and I crane my neck to peer through the sea of bobbing heads.
A few yards from the barrier, a life-size statue stands on a plinth.
People are slowing to look at it, causing a bottleneck at the barrier that will almost certainly make me late for my train.
As we shuffle nearer, I see the statue more clearly. Oh great! Some stupid rail management person has decided it would be a terrific wheeze to put a statue of
Cupid – complete with bow and arrow and cherub wings – on platform one. And it’s not even Valentine’s Day!
I throw the statue a withering look. Cupid. Famed for delivering love and desire with a single dart – or in my case, a nasty dose of hypothermia through having to wait an hour for the next train on a freezing cold platform.
As I draw closer, I see that actually, the statue is quite beautiful.
Cupid is usually depicted as a child – but this sculpted male body in carefully draped loin cloth is definitely not a boy. Sun glints on his leafy crown and on the bow, poised to deliver an arrow to some unsuspecting heart. The golden wings are so richly textured, they look as if they’ll be downy soft to the touch. I glance at the face; the eyes are cast to the ground in contemplative pose.
The statue is not only stunning, it’s peculiarly familiar.
Responding to the pressure behind me, I shuffle on. Then a second later, I stop and quickly turn, as if I think I might catch Cupid out. But it hasn’t moved a millimetre. I grin at my stupidity and start fishing about for my ticket. With a bit of luck, I might still make my train.
‘Isobel?’
I turn but the people behind look straight through me. Strange, I was sure I—
‘Isobel!’ I turn again and this time, several people are grinning openly at me. A man with a bald head points with his briefcase at the statue. ‘I think it’s talking to you.’
I swivel my head.
And Cupid comes to life, giving me a heart-stoppingly familiar grin before leaping down off the plinth.
Erik.
Chapter Twelve
When I wake next morning, I’m instantly aware that my world has changed.
The weak November sunlight filtering through the window looks different. Even the curtains seem new and fresh.
The cause of this shift in perspective gives a sort of growl, turns over and wraps himself around me so that the weight of his thigh is across my body. I feel the scratch of chest hair against my cheek and breathe in his lovely male scent.
Green Beans and Summer Dreams Page 11