‘Have you had lunch?’
‘No, but we had a big breakfast not so long ago.’
‘I’m sure you did.’
I wasn’t quite sure what she meant by that and a swell of indignation rose up in my chest. She was the one after all, who had been nagging me to go out and get a life. Well, now I had done just that, so it was a bit rich if she was going to suddenly turn around and be all negative about it.
I caught my train of thought and did my best to squash it dead. This was my mum we were talking about here – my kind, decent mother who had nothing but mine and Becky’s best interests at heart. I was being grotesquely unfair.
‘How about a cup of tea?’ I asked her.
When I glanced at Becky, who was still being gripped by my mother, her head was twisted in the direction of the French doors where Buster’s basket used to be. My stomach flipped in sadness on her behalf – yes, it had been a rollercoaster of a ride the past few days.
‘I’ll do it,’ she said, abandoning Becky to go and switch on the kettle.
‘Mummy, can I get my tea-set? And some cuddlies?’
Her beloved tea-set was up in her room, and she often liked to bring it downstairs and have a tea party with her soft toys on the living-room rug.
‘Of course, but only for a little while, okay? We’re going to have lunch soon, and then you need a bath and a change of clothes.’
The truth was, I was glad for some alone time with Mum. The chances were that Becky would have a nap this afternoon, but I wasn’t sure that this could wait that long. As soon as Becky had toddled out of the door, I opened my mouth to speak, but my mum beat me to it.
‘It’s serious then, with you and the surgeon? It must be if you and Becky stayed there last night.’
There was a slight tone of recrimination in her voice, and I tried not to let it get to me. I took a deep breath before I replied.
‘Yes, it is. We’re in love.’
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I realised how trite they sounded, but I persevered, hoping to put forward a convincing case.
I knew I had my work cut out.
‘Look, I know how crazy this sounds, how impossibly fast it’s happened, but we’re in love. We’ve both lost our spouses, and we both understand how fragile and short life is. We don’t want to waste time, and we don’t want to play games.’
She regarded me thoughtfully as the kettle boiled to its crescendo, a slight frown creasing her worn forehead and her head cocked to one side. ‘Why don’t you sit down, love?’ she said, gesturing to one of the barstools next to the island behind me. ‘You look a little manic.’
Manic? Did I? Maybe. I decided to follow her advice and take the weight off – I did happen to be feeling a little jittery, now that I thought about it. I watched her as she poured the water into the two mugs and brought over the tea, sitting down on the barstool next to me. I murmured my thanks, curling my fingers around the mug, noticing the way in which my hands trembled.
‘He would like you to come round for dinner tomorrow night, you know, so you can get to know each other properly.’
‘Don’t you think that this is all a bit sudden?’ she said, not directly answering my last statement. ‘Are you moving in with him?’
‘Yes,’ I said, figuring that honesty really was the best policy in this case.
‘Well,’ she said after a pause. ‘What does Becky think about this?’
‘I’m sure she won’t mind.’
‘Oh. You haven’t told her.’
Her accusatory tone was not without merit, I decided. This sounded completely barmy, even to my own ears.
‘It’s all been so sudden,’ I blundered on, hoping that the story would improve with more detail. ‘I mean, we haven’t set any specific dates, as such, but it’s certainly imminent.’ I hesitated for a moment, unsure of how to say what I needed to say. Sod it, I thought, for there was no easy way to say it, so I figured that I might as well just get on with it. ‘When the time comes, Aaron says you can come and live with us.’
My mum’s lips pursed and her big, brown eyes so much like my own narrowed and glinted with ill-suppressed anger. ‘Oh, he does, does he? How very considerate of him. Unlike you, Joyce, I’m not too keen on moving in with a perfect stranger, even if he has invited me round to dinner.’
I flinched at her words. It really wasn’t like her to be so out and out rude about any decision I had ever made in my life, however misinformed that decision happened to be.
‘You know how much I respect your opinion on everything, but in this instance I’m not asking for your opinion, I’m asking for your acceptance.’
‘Blind acceptance, you mean. I’m sorry Joyce, I can’t just do that, I love you too much. And I love my granddaughter.’
‘And we love you too, Mum, which is why I need you to be happy for me. This is good news. He thinks the world of Becky, and Becky thinks the world of him. This is my chance, Mum, my chance to be happy.’
‘And you’re not happy living here with me?’
I sighed in exasperation. ‘Of course I am, that’s not what I meant, and you know that. I love Aaron.’
‘How can you love him? You can’t love him, it’s impossible, you barely know him. I’m sorry, Joyce, but I’m finding this all incredibly hard to take in. And this is all coming from the woman that was so utterly broken by the death of her husband that she squirrelled herself away with her mother for years, too broken to face the real world.’
I had expected protestations on her part, but this was beyond the pale. This wasn’t like her at all, I had never seen her so anti any decision I had ever made, not even back when I had been an unruly teenager.
‘You were the one that said I had to get out there, start mingling with the real world and meeting people.’
‘I meant find some friends and go down the pub, not move in with a stranger.’
‘Will you please stop with the whole stranger thing? He is not a stranger. Besides, I don’t have any old friends here, you sent me away to boarding school, remember?’
I conceded that was perhaps an unfair dig, but then, I didn’t think she was being particularly fair, either. She had me well and truly riled.
‘When I said get out there and have some fun, I didn’t mean move in with a stranger and hand over your daughter to man you don’t even know.’
‘For God’s sake, I am not handing over my daughter, as you have so melodramatically put it. I have met a man, and we have fallen in love. I love him, Mum.’
For a second, I wondered who I was trying to convince; me or her.
‘Oh, Joyce,’ she said, her tone softening significantly. ‘Forgive me, I don’t mean to sound harsh, this is just so out the blue I can barely make sense of it. Have you even discussed this with Becky?’
‘Discussed it? Mum, she’s three.’
‘I just don’t think you’ve thought this through. His home is completely isolated. You will be isolated.’
‘I have a car,’ I pointed out.
‘That’s not the point. You can’t just walk out the front door and be amongst civilisation. You’ll miss seeing people.’
‘I’m not so great with people, in case you didn’t notice.’
‘I don’t know, you seem to be making up for lost time.’
I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose, fighting off the impending headache that threatened to swamp my brain with misery.
‘What are your motives?’ she continued.
I eyed her warily, momentarily flummoxed by the inane question. ‘My motives? As in, the butler did it the drawing-room with a candlestick because he was vastly underpaid?’
‘There’s no need to be sarcastic. I mean your motives for letting this progress so quickly. Have you ever stopped to think that you might be replacing Buster with a man? You haven’t so much as mentioned Buster since you’ve come home.’
‘What? That’s ridiculous,’ I spluttered.
I was about to carry on in
this vein, to tell her in no uncertain terms that she was way off course with this one, when I saw her face.
She was crying. Silent tears coursed down her sagging cheeks, and hastily she wiped them away on the back of her liver-spotted hand.
‘Poor Buster. And poor Becky, she’ll be heartbroken.’
My anger dissolved as surely as snow on the first day of spring, and I reached out to place my hand on top of hers which rested on the counter top, giving it a gentle squeeze.
‘I know.’
Now I could feel myself welling up, too, and I took a deep breath, pushing the tears away for later.
Yes. Poor Buster.
I looked at her more closely. I had come back home so wrapped up in my own dramas that, tears aside, I hadn’t noticed how tired my mum looked; tired and drawn. Despite being in her late sixties, normally she glowed with health and vitality. She was an unstoppable force of nature, always on the move, always doing something, even if it was something I deemed trivial, like making jam for the WI, or knitting a cardigan for Becky that would invariably be too small by the time it was finished.
Usually, her brown eyes sparkled and her skin, although sun-damaged, still had a nice glow. Not today, though. Today, her eye sockets appeared more sunken, the skin stretched tight over the bone and tinged with purple. Her brow looked more deeply furrowed than normal, especially the little vertical lines etched between her eyebrows.
Today, for the first time ever, I thought how old she was looking.
‘I don’t mean to sound so harsh, and maybe I’m overreacting, but ever since that man has exploded into your life, we’ve lost Buster, and now I feel like I’m losing my daughter and grandchild.’
‘You’re not losing us, Mum. You must have known, deep down, that the day would come where I’d meet someone, despite whatever I might’ve said to the contrary.’
‘Perhaps I did, but I never thought that it would happen this fast.’
‘He’s a good man, Mum. You’ll love him, once you get to know him.’
Yes, I thought, that was the answer to quashing my mother’s misgivings. She had only met him the once, after all, on the day he had come to take Buster away.
‘Mummy?’ a little voice called from the kitchen doorway, and I spun round guiltily, like I had been caught doing something I shouldn’t have been, which was just plain silly.
‘Hey baby,’ I said breezily. ‘Have you got your tea-set set up?’
‘Yeth.’
‘That’s great. Why don’t you go and pour me and Teddy a cup of tea, and I’ll be there in a second, okay?’
‘Okay.’
As soon as she had toddled off, my mother spoke.
‘And what about tonight? I take it you’ll be seeing him later?’
‘Yes, I am. He’s having a few friends round for dinner. Well, not friends, as such, it’s more of a work thing. It’s with the Chief Executive of the West London NHS Trust and the CMO. They’re bringing their wives and Aaron wants to hand his notice in tonight, over dinner.’
‘Can he afford to do that? What will he do with all his spare time? I just find it all a bit strange.’
‘He’s had enough, Mum. He comes from old money, so he’s not exactly going to go under, and he’s selling his flat in Kensington. He wants a fresh start.’
With me and Becky, I silently added.
‘The whole thing sounds a bit odd to me.’
‘Please don’t start. And anyway, you can ask him whatever you want over dinner tomorrow night, can’t you?’
‘Will you be sleeping there, tonight? What about your daughter? Where does she fit into your party plans?’
The tears had dried, but the bitterness was back, I sourly noted.
‘That’s up to her. Aaron would love us both to stay tonight, but if Becky would rather not, then I’ll come home after the meal. I’m in a relationship with someone, Mum, and Becky is an integral part of that. I really don’t want to swan off on an endless succession of dates and not see my daughter, I’d rather she was a part of everything right from the start. But this is if you don’t mind babysitting, of course.’
A look of hurt flashed across her eyes. ‘You know I don’t.’
I stood up, my hands on my hips. ‘Then why don’t we go and ask her, now? I want Becky to feel comfortable at all times with these new developments. Where she stays tonight is up to her.’
‘And you think that she’s old enough to choose for herself?’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, you’re being so inconsistent; you’re the one that said I should ask her what she wants.’
My mum stood up. ‘Fine. Then let’s go and found out.’
SEVENTEEN
Becky had chosen to be with me and Aaron tonight. My mum had been crestfallen and tight-lipped until the time came when Becky and I had got in the car to drive over here.
Even though we weren’t officially moving in today, it felt as if we were. It felt like a huge milestone in my life. I had packed a small holdall for me and Becky, inside which was a change of clothes, and a few toys.
Becky seemed to be perfectly at ease, doing an eight-piece jigsaw puzzle of a Disney princess on the large, oak table that ran down the centre of the kitchen. It was six o’clock, and the guests were due to arrive at seven-thirty, with a view to dinner being served at nine, the plan being that Becky would long be asleep by then. Somehow, I had my doubts that she would be.
I leaned against the counter top and watched as Aaron prepared the salad. ‘You really are the perfect man – I can’t believe that you cook, too.’
He laughed easily, glancing up at me as he chopped the sundried tomatoes on the wooden chopping board. ‘I’d hardly class making a salad as cooking.’
I smiled at him. ‘We’re not just eating salad, tonight.’
‘Yes, well, not even I can bugger up steak; they have to be the easiest thing in the world to rustle up, especially when it’s Filet mignon. That stuff is so tender it practically cooks itself. And even an inept fool like me can boil a few new potatoes and bung in a bit of butter and parsley.’
I glanced across the room at Becky, marvelling at what a self-efficient little thing she was. More often than not, she was quite happy chuntering away to herself, doing her colouring, or, in this case, agonizing over a jigsaw puzzle.
‘What time does she normally go to bed?’ Aaron asked.
‘Seven at the latest. But she might be too excited to go down that early tonight.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Well, obviously it matters if she doesn’t get her beauty sleep, but I just meant it doesn’t matter from my point of view. I’m sure she’ll charm the socks off our guests if they get to meet her.’
‘Do they have children?’
‘Rupert and Camilla have two grown-up children, I believe. Two sons. I think one of them has just produced. Gary and Linda never had children.’
‘Remind me again who’s who? I’d hate to get their names wrong and their job titles muddled. I just want to get them straight in my mind.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about that, there’s nothing formal about this dinner. This is just my pre-resignation resignation, if you catch my drift. They’re only here in Cornwall for work anyway, discussing business with the Royal Cornwall hospital. The McMillans, as in Rupert and Camilla, are in their sixties – you’ll easily tell them apart from Gary and Linda Flint, who are only forty. Rupert is the Chief Executive for West London Hospitals NHS Trust, and he’s the one I have to put out the feelers to for handing in my resignation. Gary’s the CMO, as in the Chief Medical Officer. He’s one of the top guys that liaise between government and the hospital. He heads a team of medical experts on matters of public health importance. I don’t need to consult him about my resignation, but as he’s here with Rupert on business, he’s just tagging along tonight for the free dinner. Plus he’s one of the few people I count as a friend. Or a potential friend, anyway. I’d hate to lose contact with him when I leave my job.’
I made a mental note t
o make a big effort with this Gary’s wife. I found it sweet that Aaron was making tentative moves to nurture a possible friendship, that he seemed worried about losing touch with him.
‘What time does their flight get in, again?’ I asked.
The four of them were flying to Newquay from London this afternoon, and they were booked into a five-star hotel in Penzance for the next three nights. As soon as they disembarked from the plane, the plan was that they would get a taxi to Penzance to settle into the hotel before heading on over here, by taxi. Aaron had offered to pick them up, but Rupert had been adamant that they would make their own way over as all travel expenses were courtesy of the NHS.
‘Around four, I think. They said they’d he here by seven-thirty, eight at the latest.’
I looked down at the jeans and beige, roll-neck pullover I was wearing, thinking of the simple black dress I had elected to wear tonight which was upstairs in the holdall.
‘I should get changed, soon.’
‘You can just wear what you’re wearing now, if you want to, it’s really not a formal thing. You look beautiful just as you are.’
I blushed at the compliment. ‘I have to make some effort to look presentable tonight.’
‘I’m only going to bung on a shirt,’ he said. ‘And you are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, you’d look good in a binbag.’
I waved away his compliment, blushing furiously. ‘Will you stop?’
Currently, he was wearing dark blue jeans and a chunky pullover in a shade of dark grey. I thought he looked absolutely perfect as he was, like he had just stepped out of the winter attire section of men’s clothing catalogue.
He ceased chopping the sundried tomatoes and scraped them into the wooden bowl along with the rest of the salad.
‘Mummy, I’m hungry,’ Becky piped up from the kitchen table.
She slid off the bench and came over to me, wrapping her arms around my thighs and burying her face in the side of my hips.
‘But baby, you’ve just had pizza,’ I said.
Aaron had rustled up a frozen pizza an hour ago, and we had all sat down together at the table and mainly watched her eat. I had been struck by how sweet a gesture it was on Aaron’s behalf; how he had instinctively understood that it should feel like a “proper” meal, even though me and Aaron were eating again later and only ate a slice each very slowly to keep Becky company at the table.
The Silenced Wife Page 13