Secrets and Scandals in Little Woodford

by Catherine Jones

‘Oh.’

  ‘So, what’s he up to? What is he doing on a Tuesday night that gives him a reason to stay up in town for a few extra hours and which doesn’t involve badminton?’

  Heather sighed and shrugged.

  ‘I’m not imagining it and I can only think of one thing. I mean, can you think of anything else?’

  Heather stared at Olivia, not wishing to supply the obvious answer.

  Olivia shook her head. ‘What do I do, Heather? Do I pretend everything is OK and that I know nothing, or do I confront him? Have it out?’

  ‘Maybe there is something going on but Nigel wanting to downsize doesn’t mean he’s planning to leave you. Maybe he’s not playing badminton but maybe he needs money for his pension or he wants to set up a trust fund for the kids...’

  ‘Or maybe Nigel’s having an affair and is getting his other’ – Olivia made double quotation marks in the air with her fingers – ‘“affairs” in order before he gets rid of me.’

  ‘Then you have to talk to him.’ She reached out and gave Olivia a hug. For Olivia this simple act of kindness was the last straw and she broke down in sobs.

  Later that day the papers for the next day’s council meeting appeared in the Dropbox on Olivia’s iPad. They were, she thought, a welcome distraction – something to think about other than what might be happening to her marriage. She began to read through the applications for planning consent. Coombe Farm was one of the issues to be discussed.

  Olivia stared at the screen of her tablet as she read the detailed application from the developers. In her head she knew she ought to oppose these houses, but her heart told her that it was, despite the proximity to some social housing, altogether a nicer, classier estate than the jerry-built one that was going up behind the station. If her life was about to go belly-up, she thought she’d rather wind up at Coombe Farm than Beeching Rise. She carried on reading the council papers and decided that there was only one course of action she could take. She knew it would make her unpopular but, given the mess her life seemed to be in, a bit of unpopularity would be a small price to pay if she could make her future less bleak.

  *

  Joan got the big key out of her mac pocket and opened the vestry door, stepping into the cool room that, as always, smelt faintly musty. She slipped off her mac and put on her pinny which she kept hanging up in the next cupboard to the one the vicar kept his vestments in. Then she picked up a tin of polish and a couple of yellow dusters and made her way into the body of the church. Pews and pulpit today, she decided as she began to work. She headed to the back of the church. She had a method; first she’d work from the back forwards, down the pews on the left of the main aisle then the ones on the right, till she got to the ones nearest the main church door. That way nothing got missed. And while she was at it she’d have a look at the kneelers.

  Joan slid into the pew the furthest from the altar and began polishing and dusting the shelf for the prayer books, shuffling along every few seconds to reach the next section. As she went she picked the kneelers off their hooks and gave each one a once-over. Those that needed some repairs she left on the seat. She worked quickly and efficiently and in silence. She was about halfway along when she heard someone else enter the church.

  She glanced towards the vestry door from behind a pillar. It was the vicar. As she watched she saw him go to the choir stalls and take a seat. Then he bowed his head. Joan carried on cleaning, being as quiet as possible, not wanting to disturb his prayers.

  As she finished the pew she was working on she stood up to tiptoe into the next one and was stopped in her tracks by a noise. A sob.

  This ain’t right, she thought. She stood stock-still and listened. Another muffled wail. What on earth was up with the Reverend? Something wasn’t right if he was here, on his own, having a cry. Joan leaned on the end of the pew. Should she go to him? Should she pretend she wasn’t around? But what if he spotted her? She made up her mind. She dropped her can of spray polish on the old stone flags. It made a resounding and satisfactory clatter.

  ‘Darn it,’ she said loudly as she made a show of scuffling around on the floor to retrieve it.

  ‘Is that you, Joan?’ she heard the vicar call.

  ‘Oh, Reverend! Good heavens, you gave me quite a start! I didn’t hear you come in.’ She squeezed her way through to the main aisle. ‘I just popped in to give the pews a once-over. I hope I’m not in your way.’

  ‘No, no, you carry on. I came in to have a bit of a think but you needn’t mind me.’

  ‘Whatever you say, Reverend.’ Joan turned to go back to where she’d left off when an agonising stab of pain hit her. She gasped, involuntarily. Brian jumped out of his seat and ran towards her.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Joan, lowering herself into a pew. She shut her eyes as she waited for the spasm to pass. Brian crouched beside her and patted her hand.

  ‘Don’t tell me this is heartburn,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ Joan insisted through clenched teeth.

  Brian stared at her. ‘Look, Joan, call me a fusspot but this is twice I’ve seen you in pain. I think I ought to tell Bert you’re not well.’

  Joan opened her eyes and stared at him. ‘You breathe a word to Bert and I’ll tell Heather you were in here crying.’

  ‘I wasn’t.’

  Joan pursed her lips and shook her head. ‘Lying, and in God’s house.’ She tutted.

  Brian stared back at her, defiantly, but couldn’t hold her gaze. ‘Deal,’ he said. ‘But I want you to promise me you’ll see the doc.’

  ‘I’ll promise to do that, if you’ll tell me what’s bothering you.’ Wincing, Joan budged up along the pew and patted the space she’d left. ‘Come on, Reverend, what’s so terrible you can’t tell your missus?’

  ‘You really want to know?’

  Joan nodded.

  ‘I... I think I’ve lost my faith.’

  Joan almost said ‘Is that all?’ before she realised that, for the vicar, it was a very big deal indeed. ‘Is that what caused you to have that turn when you were giving your sermon the other Sunday?’

  Brian nodded. ‘I felt I was on a cliff-edge – that there was nothing underneath me. It was terrifying and it was all I could think about. I lost the plot. I suddenly felt that my whole life had been a completely futile waste of time.’

  ‘Don’t say that, Reverend. Not with all that you’ve done for people over the years.’

  Brian shook his head. ‘But for what?’

  ‘Does it matter if you’ve brought them comfort? It can’t have been wrong to do good.’

  ‘Maybe.’ He didn’t sound convinced.

  She nodded, gravely. ‘So, what’s brought on this business with your faith?’

  Brian sighed and shrugged. ‘That’s the point; I don’t know. It just went.’ He paused then said, ‘One day I felt like I was praying into a great big empty space, a void... nothing.’

  ‘So,’ said Joan, ‘there’s nothing to say it mayn’t come back then.’

  ‘I suppose.’

  ‘I mean, it might only be temporary.’

  ‘It might not be.’

  ‘But you don’t know. Like whatever it is that’s not right with me.’ Brian looked perplexed. ‘It may be the same with you – only the other way round, so to speak, cos you had something you wanted and it’s gone but you’d like it back. On the other hand I’ve got summat I don’t want and but I’m expecting it to go away and never return.’

  ‘Maybe.’ The vicar sounded supremely doubtful. ‘And in the meantime I’m being a complete hypocrite.’

  ‘The congregation don’t know that,’ said Joan. The spasm had passed and she spoke with more energy.

  ‘But I do.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘But it’s wrong. You said yourself it was wrong to lie in church.’

  ‘There’s lying and there’s not sharing everything with everyone.’ She saw Brian suppress a smile. ‘And, if you ask me, them what c
ome to church believe, and they don’t need to know you’re having a bit of a moment with your faith. As long as you do everything you’re paid to do they’ll be happy. You having a crisis won’t help them and if your faith comes back no one need be any the wiser.’

  ‘And if it doesn’t?’

  ‘Don’t meet trouble halfway, I say.’

  Brian stared at her. He was sure there was a deep theological argument that he should use to tell Joan that her reasoning was hopelessly flawed and yet... and yet what she said made sense in a perverse way.

  ‘What you got to lose, Reverend?’ Joan hauled herself to her feet. ‘And this ain’t getting the church clean,’ she said.

  ‘You promise me you’ll see the doc?’

  ‘I said I would, didn’t I?’

  ‘Good.’ Brian stayed in the pew looking at the altar as Joan huffed and puffed her way over to the side pews and carried on with her cleaning.

  24

  The following morning Amy let herself into Olivia’s house and called out a greeting.

  In reply she heard, ‘I’m upstairs, Amy. Could you come up here, please?’

  Amy sighed and went up to the first floor. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘In Zac’s room.’

  Amy walked along the corridor to the open door. She peered in. If Ashley let his room get into this state she’d give him a clip round his ear. And, oh God, what was that smell?

  ‘I know, it’s awful, isn’t it?’ said Olivia, reading Amy’s mind. ‘And I’ve had the windows wide open for about half an hour.’ She sighed. ‘I know I’ve always said you don’t have to deal with Zac’s room but it’s got beyond a joke. I asked him at the weekend to tidy it... Well, as he didn’t then it’s going to be tidied for him.’

  Amy was tempted to ask for extra money to deal with this shithole.

  ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘That’s all I can ask.’

  ‘I won’t get nothing else done today.’

  ‘I realise that. But if that’s what it takes to sort this out, then so be it.’

  Amy gazed at the mess and decided that she wasn’t going to touch anything without rubber gloves on. She suppressed a shudder. ‘Whatever you say, Mrs L.’

  ‘Do the best you can.’

  Amy shook her head slowly. ‘I can’t promise I’ll get it sorted in three hours. Besides, won’t your Zac have a view about me messing with his stuff?’

  ‘Huh! Given the way he’s behaved recently I don’t very much care if he does.’

  Oo-er. The apple of Mrs L’s eye must have pissed her off. Mind you, thought Amy, if he’d been her son she’d have told him he’d crossed the line a few years back. He’d got right out of hand, if half of what her Ash said was true. Cocky little bastard.

  ‘OK, then, Mrs L. Whatever you say.’

  ‘I’ve got to go out. I’ll leave your money in the kitchen as always. I’ll see you next time.’

  Amy surveyed the room as Olivia went off and worked out what she’d need to do a proper job before she went back downstairs and collected a whole bunch of cleaning fluids and cloths from the kitchen cupboards, plus some rubber gloves and the hoover and lugged everything upstairs. Then she went to the airing cupboard and got out a set of clean bedding. No point in spoiling the ship for the proverbial ha’porth.

  Amy eyed the bed. With a finger and thumb she pinched a corner of the duvet and pulled it back. Gross. When had the sheets on that last been changed? Maybe that was a question best left unanswered. She squared her shoulders and braced herself for the task ahead as she pulled on her rubber gloves and set about stripping the bed. Half an hour later the bed had fresh sheets, the windows were shining, the waste-paper basket was empty and all Zac’s dirty linen and discarded clothes were in the laundry basket behind the door in the bathroom and order was starting to emerge. Amy decided that the room smelt fresh enough now to shut the windows and make a start on clearing up the rest of the muddles that were strewn around; the half-empty mugs of tea and coffee, the dirty plates, the piles of books, the DVDs out of their boxes...

  She stacked the crockery and carried it downstairs and put it in the dishwasher. The washer, she noticed, was almost full so she found a detergent tablet and bunged it in the drawer. If the cycle finished before she was done for the morning she’d empty it for Mrs L before she left.

  She returned to Zac’s bedroom and began to stack books and papers with a ruthless efficiency. She finished with the books and began on the DVDs and PlayStation games. She swept up all the discs and their boxes and piled them on the bed where she sat beside them, snapping the shiny discs into their right containers and then tossing them gently onto the dressing table ready to be slotted into the rack when she’d sorted them all out. She pitched a case with less care than she intended and it slid across the polished surface and tipped between the piece of furniture and the wall.

  ‘Bollocks,’ she swore. She tried to get her hand down the back of the dressing table but the gap was far too narrow. She braced herself, got a bit of leverage and dragged it away from the wall. She knelt beside it and squeezed her arm into the gap at skirting board level and felt around for the case.

  ‘Don’t know why I’m bothering,’ she told herself. ‘Zac won’t know it’s missing in amongst that lot.’ She eyed the large collection of films and games in his possession, piled up in front of her. Spoilt little sod. She touched something soft and squashy and jumped, a little squeak of disgust escaping from her. Then she realised it was a plastic bag and not something sinister. She pulled it out and examined it. She knew pot when she saw it. She pulled the furniture even further away from the wall and found another bag, and a whole bunch of other stuff. That was quite a habit he had going there. The thing was, what was she going to do about it? Should she tell Mrs L or not? While it might be quite satisfactory to get Zac into some very hot water, it wasn’t really any of her business. And anyway, Mrs L mightn’t take kindly to being told her Zac wasn’t the blue-eyed boy she liked to think he was – and she certainly wouldn’t like to hear it from her cleaner. She pushed it back where she’d found it and decided to think about what she ought to do later.

  *

  Zac stared at his room in disbelief. What the fuck? Then he spun round and thundered towards the stairs before he skidded to a halt on the polished wood of the landing. He shot back to his room and levered his dressing table away from the wall. There, on the carpet, was his stash. He sagged with relief. Thank fuck that hadn’t been found. He could just imagine the row from his parents if they knew he was on drugs, quite apart from the fact that it would have cost him to replace it and Zac didn’t think that Dan would back down over his decision about not offering him any more credit. And he’d need more soon – what he had hidden wasn’t going to last much longer. As things stood it would be tricky to make it stretch till he was due his next allowance, assuming he got it, he thought as he pushed his dressing table back where it belonged.

  ‘You had no right,’ he yelled, confronting his mother in the kitchen. She stopped chopping vegetables and turned around.

  She looked up at him and narrowed her eyes. ‘If you’re talking about your room then I had every right. It was a disgrace. I asked you to tidy it at the weekend and you did nothing about it. I told you that if you didn’t do it, I’d get Amy to sort it. Well... you ignored me and I decided it was time you learned a lesson.’

  What was the matter with her? First his allowance and now this. For fuck’s sake, why couldn’t she leave him alone – let him get on with his own life?

  ‘But why? It’s my room. I like it like that.’

  ‘It smelt.’

  ‘So?’

  His mother rolled her eyes. ‘Because this is my house and I won’t have you treating it like a squat. I’ve had enough of you ignoring me, of never doing anything I ask. Your father is right – your brother and sisters were never like this and it’s time you stopped behaving like a total waste of space.’

  ‘I’m not.’

&n
bsp; His mother eyed him. ‘Then don’t behave like you are.’

  ‘Amy had no business to go through my things.’

  ‘She didn’t “go through” your things. She tidied up. It took her three hours and frankly, if I decide to let you have next month’s allowance, I am sorely tempted to take the money I paid her, out of it.’

  ‘That’s not fair.’

  Olivia took a step closer to him and leaned towards him, the knife she was holding pointing at his nose. ‘I don’t care.’

  Zac backed away, suddenly intimidated. ‘No need to get arsey,’ he said.

  ‘Arsey? Look who’s talking. Anyway, I haven’t time to argue. If you don’t want a repeat of this incident then I suggest you keep your room tidy in future. I bet Megan Millar doesn’t behave like this.’

  ‘How would you know?’

  ‘Because I’ve met her and her stepmother and she’s a nice kid. Unlike you these days.’

  ‘Well, maybe her mother isn’t a total cow like you,’ Zac shouted at her as he stormed out of the house.

  25

  ‘Megan, Megan,’ came Bex’s voice from the bottom of the stairs.

  Megan dropped her pen and went down to the landing where she leaned over the banisters.

  ‘Yes?’

  Bex stood in the hall, her hand on the newel post.

  ‘Are you busy?’

  ‘Got a bunch of French vocab to learn.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Alfie wants to go and see the diggers and when I said I was too busy to take him he had a full-on meltdown. I’d do it, but I’ve got spammed for making cakes for the school fair as well as running a stall and I was hoping to get a couple of batches of fairy cakes baked before supper.’

  Megan sighed. She supposed she could always do her homework after supper. ‘Look, tell Alfie I’ll take him in about fifteen minutes. Let me learn my French and then I can do the rest when we get back.’

  ‘Megan, you’re a star.’

  ‘And I can take Lewis as well, if he doesn’t mind watching JCBs for a while, and then we can go to the swings after.’