A Place to Call Home

by Carole Matthews

  Amazingly, she looks quite taken with the idea. ‘Often, when we have a glut of things, I have to give produce away. It makes me a very popular lady at the WI and the day centre that I go to,’ she says with a proud smile. ‘But it would be nice to be able to use more at home.’

  Perhaps Joy, like me, is searching for approval.

  ‘Then we’ll try to do that.’

  ‘Hayden never eats, and Crystal thinks Cadbury’s Dairy Milk is a vegetable,’ she adds waspishly.

  That makes me laugh.

  ‘I can hear you talking about me.’ Crystal comes into the kitchen and yawns.

  She’s barefoot and is wearing a very small dressing gown. There’s nothing beneath it but underwear, equally small. No nightdress or anything. I should think that Hayden would be very interested in her appearance, but he doesn’t give her a second glance. Whereas I can hardly take my eyes away. How can someone be so comfortable with their body? It’s voluptuous and strains against the confines of her clothes. I can’t help but glance down at my own boyish body, my small breasts. They are tiny limes compared to Crystal’s ripe watermelons.

  ‘Chocolate’s made of cocoa beans,’ Crystal counters. ‘It’s a vegetable. True fact.’

  Joy rolls her eyes.

  Sabina tries out her high five for the third time.

  ‘Wotcha, Beanie,’ Crystal says, returning it. ‘All right?’

  Sabina nods. I may be reading too much into this, but I think there’s a light behind my child’s eyes that’s been missing for a long time. Her face, so often totally impassive, seems a little more animated. I hope it’s not simply that I’m wishing it so.

  ‘We could walk round the garden after breakfast,’ Joy suggests to me. ‘See what there is to pick for a meal this evening. Not much at this time of year, of course.’

  ‘I’d like to cook for you all again,’ I say. ‘If that’s all right.’ When I was at home my only solace was to hide in the kitchen and cook. It was the one and only thing I could do to please my husband. ‘I don’t wish to impose.’

  ‘Sounds good to me,’ Crystal says. ‘Impose away. I’m going to get as fat as a house with you here.’ Though there are plenty of empty seats, she nudges my daughter off her own chair, then pulls her back on to her knee and wraps her arms round her. ‘We love your mum’s cooking, don’t we, Bean?’

  Sabina nods vigorously.

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t really like foreign food,’ Joy says. ‘I have a delicate palate.’

  ‘Bollocks, you do,’ Crystal says. ‘You’re just an old stick-in-the-mud.’

  ‘I could try to make a dish that I think you’d like.’

  ‘Well,’ Joy says, looking pointedly at Crystal. ‘If it’s not too spicy.’

  ‘Get some chilli down her neck,’ Crystal says. ‘A bit of fire in your belly might warm you up, Joy.’

  I smile sympathetically at the older lady. ‘It’s fine to like what you like, I think.’

  She looks pleased by that.

  Crystal leans in to Sabina conspiratorially. ‘Nick a bit of Hayden’s toast for me,’ she stage-whispers. ‘Look, Hayden!’ She points to the garden and, obligingly, Hayden swivels his head.

  Sabina, quick as a flash, reaches out and steals a slice of toast from his plate. Crystal bites it quickly as Hayden looks back, pretending to be shocked. My daughter covers her mouth with both hands and I hope for a moment that she might burst out with a spontaneous giggle. It’s not to be. But we all laugh at her antics and I feel this is a good environment for her. They don’t tiptoe around her and treat her as if she’s odd or special. They treat her like a normal little girl, and for that my heart is glad.

  ‘What about a birthday tickle?’ Crystal says, and launches into a gentle tickling assault on Sabina.

  My daughter throws back her head and opens her mouth wide. It’s very good to see. For months her face has been solemn, impassive, dead, and it’s almost as if I can see her coming back to life before my eyes.

  Hayden and I exchange a glance and he gives me a surreptitious wink. He too can see that my daughter will be happy here.

  This is a good place for us to be, I think. A very good place.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  When I’ve cleared up after breakfast, Joy folds her newspaper and makes noises to say that she’s ready to take me on my tour as I’ve requested. Quickly I wipe my hands.

  ‘Come with us, my daughter?’

  Sabina shakes her head and leans against Crystal. She’s happy where she is and that’s nice.

  Joy leads the way into the garden and I follow close behind. I must be very careful not to step on her toes as this is clearly her domain.

  ‘I like spring,’ she says over her shoulder to me. ‘When the garden lies dormant, trying to survive over the cold winter, it’s easy to forget the gorgeous flowers that bide their time beneath the surface, waiting to surprise you all over again with their beauty.’

  ‘I feel like that myself,’ I confess to Joy. ‘I’ve been in the dark and cold, waiting until I could unfurl my petals to the sunshine again.’

  ‘Oh, you darling girl,’ Joy says, frowning. ‘It must have been a terrible time for you.’

  ‘Yes. Now I hope that there’ll be no more winter for us,’ I say. ‘My dream is that we’ll always live in sunshine.’

  ‘I hope so too.’ Self-consciously, she touches my arm. Then, in a voice that’s not steady, she surprises me by confiding, ‘I’m no stranger to domestic difficulties myself. Of a different nature to yours,’ she adds, ‘but my marriage wasn’t a walk in the park either.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  She waves my comment away with a flick of her hand. I’d thought that Joy was too strong a person to have suffered in this way, but she doesn’t offer any more and I don’t like to ask.

  We stand together on the terrace, gazing out over the lawn and the expanse of garden that stretches away from us. ‘It looks lovely,’ I tell her. ‘A credit to you.’

  For the moment, she seems lost for words, so I take in the view before me. At the bottom of the garden there’s a variety of mature trees that screen off the surrounding houses. There’s also a summerhouse, but it doesn’t look as if it’s ever used. The borders, to an untrained eye, appear to be immaculately tended. Joy obviously lavishes a lot of love on this garden.

  ‘There’s a wide variety of herbs on the patio,’ she says, brisk again, and we go to look at the arrangement of tubs sheltered against the wall of the house. ‘Feel free to use those as you will. There’s parsley, sage, marjoram, thyme – three different varieties, including lemon – mint and rosemary. The chives grow like weeds, but they look very pretty with their purple pom-poms in bloom.’

  I recognise all of these. It makes me think of my daddy, bent over in the sunshine, tending our small patch of garden at home. The things he grew there, you can’t imagine. My grandparents too had lush and productive land that they tended. I’d like to think that green fingers run in the family but, to be frank, I wouldn’t know where to start.

  ‘When I was a child in Sri Lanka, every year we used to visit my uncle,’ I tell Joy. ‘He lives in a place called Matale, high in the hills near Kandy, and runs a spice farm. We used to love it there. He grows cinnamon, pepper, nutmeg, clove and mace. It’s a very beautiful place.’ If I close my eyes, I can recall all of the scents, the muskiness of the damp soil and the humid heat of the jungle of leaves, Hinni and me running between the towering trees. It makes me long to go home. ‘My mummy taught me how to use all the flavours in her family recipes.’

  ‘I used to enjoy cooking,’ Joy says. ‘Baking especially. The boys used to love my cakes and biscuits. But there’s no point in baking for yourself, is there?’

  ‘Could you show me how to bake, Joy?’ I ask. ‘I’m good with spicy meals and curries, but I’m not so very good with cakes.’

  ‘Perhaps I could do that,’ she says grudgingly. ‘Though when I’ll find the time, I don’t know. Shall we look at th
e rest of this garden or not?’

  I fall into step behind her as she marches past the beds, barking out the names of plants as we go. ‘The snowdrops have all gone, but the crocuses add a spot of colour.’ She points out some yellow and blue flowers. ‘That’s forsythia.’ A shrub with delicate yellow flowers. ‘The spring colours are so bright.’

  ‘That’s because they know we need a lift after all the greyness of winter.’

  Joy turns to me. ‘I’ve done all this myself. Hayden’s not the slightest bit interested. Such a shame.’

  ‘I’m sure he appreciates it.’

  ‘I’m not entirely sure he even notices it,’ she counters. ‘He rarely comes out of his room, let alone ventures into the garden.’ She shakes her head, as if she simply can’t understand it. ‘You have to be busy in the garden in spring. There’s a lot of tidying up, a lot of preparation for summer.’ We go through an avenue of eight trees in full blossom, heading towards an area that’s been put aside for vegetables.

  ‘Flowering cherry.’ Joy points up at their delicate pink flowers. She plucks a single bloom and hands it to me. ‘Beautiful, but one stiff wind and this will all be gone.’

  With questions burning in my mind, I risk asking her something personal. ‘How long have your children lived overseas, Joy?’

  She doesn’t look at me when she replies. ‘Malcolm, my eldest, he’s been in Hong Kong for ten years. He has an English wife, Pat, and two lovely daughters, Kerry and Emma. They’re sixteen and fourteen now.’

  ‘You’ve never been there?’

  ‘No… no,’ she blusters. ‘They ask me. Regularly. It’s not for me though.’ She examines a bush for some imagined flaw. ‘Who’d look after the garden, if I jumped on a plane every ten minutes? It would have gone to rack and ruin by the time I got back.’

  I don’t point out that, from what little I know about Hayden, I’m sure he could afford to employ a gardener, even on a temporary basis.

  We march on to the greenhouse. Inside it’s very warm, heady with the smell of damp earth and vegetation.

  ‘Tomatoes,’ she says, pointing to some green shoots. ‘There’s three different varieties – Gardener’s Delight, San Marzano and Costoluto Fiorentino. We’ll be sick to the back teeth of them in a couple of months.’

  ‘I could make tomato curry and serve it with pol mallun, a coconut chutney, and a traditional Sri Lankan dish, string hoppers.’

  My companion looks slightly alarmed by this suggestion.

  ‘Soup,’ she says. ‘They’re good for tomato soup. The ones that stay green are excellent for chutney. There’s some basil here too,’ Joy continues. ‘Don’t know if that goes into the kind of thing you like to cook?’

  ‘I will try it.’

  ‘Basil’s probably more for Italian food.’

  ‘Do you eat that?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ Joys says, looking horrified at the thought. ‘Too much garlic. Plays havoc with my digestion.’ She goes back outside and strides towards a bank of raised beds. I trot behind her.

  ‘I’ve got potatoes here.’ Joy points them all out as she talks. ‘And spinach. Cabbage. There’s one or two cauliflowers left and a few late beetroots. Some carrots which will be ready soon. The runner beans are getting going in the greenhouse and I’ll plant them out here when it’s time.’

  ‘I do a nice side dish with beans fried Gujarati-style with chilli.’

  Joy wrinkles her nose. ‘Courgettes. We’ll be eating those until they’re coming out of our ears too.’

  I’ll try to think of interesting ways to present them, perhaps as a curry or as a pickle. ‘Already, I’m quite excited about the opportunity to cook with such lovely home-grown produce.’

  She beams at that. ‘You’re in for a treat. You’ve not seen the fruit yet.’

  We pass through an opening in a hedge. Beyond it there are fruit cages and more raised beds. I can tell that this is where the rhubarb came from.

  ‘Apple trees,’ Joy says. ‘Some bakers, some eaters. Plums and pears, but they’ve been a bit patchy the last few years. I could teach you how to rustle up a nice crumble. Stephen was always very keen on a crumble.’ She smiles sadly. ‘He always puts that in his letters.’

  ‘Your other son?’ I venture.

  ‘He’s the younger one, but he’s lived abroad for many years. Likes the lifestyle and the sunshine. We don’t get a lot of that here. He’s been all over the place. I can hardly keep up. They’re all in Singapore now and he’s married a girl from there.’

  ‘They have children too?’

  ‘Three. The girls are four and two. They’ve a new baby boy as well. He’s called Jay and must be six months old now.’ She turns her gaze on me. ‘And, before you ask, no, I haven’t been out to see them either.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to visit your new grandson?’

  ‘Of course I would,’ Joy snaps. ‘But it’s just not possible. I don’t fly. I don’t eat foreign food. I haven’t got that kind of money. I have to be content to wait until they come here.’

  ‘We can do anything that we want to, Joy,’ I say softly. ‘A few days ago I was a person who dared not speak to her own shadow. I found a way to change that.’

  ‘You’re young,’ she scoffs. ‘You have your whole life ahead of you.’

  ‘I am young, but I’ve wasted many years being scared of life.’

  ‘I know all about that.’ She shrugs and her shoulders look burdened. ‘All water under the bridge now. Anyway, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. I’m seventy-five. Ancient in today’s eyes. I’m at the tail end of my life.’

  I take her hand and tuck it into the crook of my elbow as we turn back towards the house. ‘All the more reason to enjoy every day and experience new things.’

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Hayden felt weirdly energised today. It was as if he could actually feel the blood surging round his veins. Something he hadn’t felt in a long time. Every nerve in his skin was alive and zinging. It was as if he’d just bounded off stage at Wembley Arena, high on adrenalin, drunk on the ecstasy of the crowd.

  If that’s what a good night’s sleep and some coffee and toast for breakfast could do, then he needed more of them in his life.

  It had felt strangely good to be sitting at the breakfast table with the rag-tag of life that constituted this household. Not that Crystal – or any of the ladies – would be happy to be classed as rag-tag. It was an arrangement that shouldn’t work but somehow did. They coped very well with his eccentricities and he with theirs.

  He wanted to do something. Anything. He didn’t know what. Leap tall buildings with one single bound. Unless he channelled some energy, he’d end up pacing the house relentlessly. Joy and Ayesha had gone for a tour of the garden. He could follow them, he supposed, but gardening wasn’t really his thing and he felt as if Ayesha wanted to spend some time alone bonding with Joy. That had to be a good thing.

  Crystal had picked up a glossy magazine and was glancing through it with the kid still nestled on her lap. She looked comfortable with the child, and he realised that she really would make a great mum. They were both engrossed in whatever the current gossip was. He couldn’t stand to look at the glossies any more, even though the minutiae of his own life no longer graced the pages.

  Hayden pushed away from the table.

  Crystal glanced up. ‘All right?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m great,’ he said and, even to himself, he sounded perplexed by it.

  She grinned back over Sabina’s head.

  He didn’t want to go down into the basement to work out. It was another glorious spring day and he wanted to feel fresh air blowing through the house.

  Not knowing what else to do, he made his way into the living room. The cushions on the sofa still bore the indents from where he and Ayesha had sat until late reading Bridget Jones’s Diary. She’d made small steps forward and her reading wasn’t nearly as bad as she imagined. It had been difficult to start with because the book had been one of Laura�
��s favourites. He’d always asked her how she could still laugh at it when she’d read it time and time again. It was a keeper, she’d teased, just like him.

  The room was dark and he threw back the curtains on the French doors to the garden. The sunlight flooded in, catching a flurry of dust motes in the air, and he opened the doors wide to let in the day. He watched Ayesha and Joy conducting a tour of the borders and then disappearing down towards Joy’s sanctuary, the vegetable plot. He should eat more fresh food, he thought, put some strength back into his body. It was about time he went into the garden too. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been to see what was going on out there. Joy was always busy and he should take more notice of what she did. But then, it was fair to say that he hadn’t been interested in very much of anything in recent times.

  Ayesha was a nice woman, Hayden thought. Quiet, uncertain of herself on the surface, but he could see that there was an inner resolve, and he could only admire that. For someone so timid on the surface, there was a little bit of feistiness lurking beneath it. Already a few of her questions had left him breathless with their directness. He hoped she would blossom here, lose the fear that obviously stalked her. It had torn him up inside when she thought he was going to raise a hand to her last night. What sort of a bloke had she been married to? If she could fight back from what she’d been through, why couldn’t he do the same?

  When Ayesha and Joy moved out of sight, he turned back towards the room and the sunlight fell on the piano. He sat on the stool, as he’d done in the moonlight the other night, but this time the energy felt very different. This time he wasn’t fearful. There was a trembling deep down in his stomach, but it felt hopeful. Eager.

  He let his fingers dance on the keys. Hesitant at first, he tried a couple of classics, nothing too threatening, nothing too emotional. There were a few stumbles, a few halting trills, but it wasn’t too bad from someone who was so rusty. He couldn’t, however, quite make his voice come again. That seemed to be beyond him. Every time he opened his mouth to try, he could feel his throat tighten, his vocal cords protest, his tongue seemingly grow to twice its normal size.