Summer at the Comfort Food Cafe

by Debbie Johnson

  I never had to wash another clean work shirt for him or sort a fresh pair of socks, or dry his favourite Superman T-shirt that had holes in the armpits. I never needed to use the special Fairy non-bio because of his sensitive skin, and I never had to iron another pair of trousers. Because he never needed anything else from me ever again.

  Eventually, my mother took charge and simply bundled the whole lot home with her to do herself. She washed them and dried them and folded them, and together we decided what needed to go to the charity shop, and what should be binned. To be fair, it’s not as callous as it sounds – those clothes of his had been in the basket for three months by that stage, and it wasn’t fair on the kids, apart from anything else, constantly seeing them there. It makes me cringe when I look back, in all honesty. I was definitely a teeny bit insane, which must have been frightening for them.

  So I let my mum bag them up and bin them, partly because it was the right thing to do, and also because I was going through a kind of zombie stage back then. I was very malleable and easy to move around, like a lump of play dough in human form. I wasn’t good at making decisions and I wasn’t good at resisting them either.

  Luckily, my mum didn’t expand her Empire of Common Sense to the bedroom, and I took comfort in the knowledge that I had a secret stash of David lurking on a hook on the back of the door.

  I had his dressing gown, a big bulky burgundy fleece. He’d had it for years and he’d lost the belt in the garden when we used it for an impromptu tug of war with the kids. Jimbo had chewed one sleeve and the left-side pocket was falling off. He’d really needed a new one and I’d mentally added it to his Christmas list.

  But its ragged state didn’t matter at all to me. What mattered was the fact that it still smelled of him; of him, and his deodorant, and the Old Spice aftershave the kids had bought him as a joke birthday present and he claimed to love.

  If you’ve ever lost anyone, you’ll know how important your sense of smell is. Walking into a room that smelled like David could literally take my breath away. An impromptu waft of his aftershave could reduce me to rubble. I couldn’t even sit in the car for weeks afterwards, the aroma was so very ‘him’. I also kept automatically getting into the passenger side, because he did the bulk of the driving, and waiting for him to get in next to me.

  After a while, those little things – the outward signs of a life being half-lived, of a life in flux – started to fade. I got used to the driving. I accepted that his clothes were gone. I stopped bursting into tears every time I smelled Old Spice. But I never, ever, let go of that dressing gown.

  I suspect it’s a sign of some kind of mental breakdown, so I keep it secret, tucked away in a Tesco carrier bag in my underwear drawer, only getting it out at night. It’s rarely seen, but always nearby – usually under the pillow he slept on (and yes, it did take me a very long time to allow my mother to strip the bed linens as well), or on particularly difficult evenings, cuddled up in my arms like a big, fleecy cat. The smell is faint now, barely there – but it’s comforting anyway.

  That night had definitely been a full-on fleecy-cat-cuddling kind of night, and I finally fell asleep after half an hour of Very Deep Thinking. About Lizzie. About Nate. About me. About our future, and what it might hold. About starting a new job tomorrow. About meeting Cherie Moon. About Matt. About the fact that Jimbo was so very old. About that scene in Casino Royale where James Bond is in the shower comforting a trembling Vesper Lynd and manages to be really sexy even though he’s fully clothed … at that point, I suspect I drifted off into a happier place.

  I was still cuddling my fake David, but he wouldn’t mind. He’d always respected my relationship with Daniel Craig.

  I’d slept surprisingly well, which was perhaps a result of the wine intake, and now I’m awake. Groggy, but awake. I glance at my watch on the cabinet – 9.38am – and give David a quick ‘good morning’ smile.

  I stretch out, swipe the sleep out of my eyes and get out of bed. I carefully wrap my precious dressing gown up in the carrier bag and tuck it under the pillow for later.

  I go for a morning tinkle and then tiptoe to Lizzie’s room. I push the door open, just a teeny, tiny bit, and see her there. She’s splayed across the predictably flowered duvet, one pyjama-clad leg under and one leg hooked over, and her hair is a mass of tangles against the pillowcase. She’s still fast asleep, her eyelids moving slightly as she dreams, her lips open. She looks about ten years old, and my heart melts. Still my precious baby girl. Especially when she’s asleep.

  Today, I promise myself as I head for the shower, is going to be a good day. It will be positive and exciting, and fulfilling. And I will do my very best not to end up in any ridiculous situations that give Lizzie the opportunity to document my downfall live and online.

  Chapter 8

  ‘Mum!’ shouts Nate, as I am busily burning toast in the kitchen. ‘There’s a picture of a strange man in the downstairs loo!’

  I frown, throw the irredeemably black slices into the bin, and go to see what all the fuss is about. I make a mental note to dash back in time to turn the new, improved toast over on the grill. Some cook I’m turning out to be – completely flummoxed by the lack of a toaster.

  I knock politely on the toilet door, because despite the fact that I carried this small person in my own body for nine months, Nate has become quite private since his twelfth birthday. When I have time, I feel a little worried about it – he’s at that age where there is probably a lot of stuff going on with him; a lot of boy stuff, which he obviously doesn’t want to talk to me about. So I tread carefully, let him know I’m available and don’t barge into the bathroom.

  He pulls open the door and points in something akin to wonder at a framed black-and-white photo that’s hanging on the wall over the cistern.

  At that point, Lizzie also comes in, her hair doing the Macarena over her face, phone in hand as usual. Just to complete the set, Jimbo pokes his way through our legs, sniffing at the toilet rim and wagging his tail so hard he’s whacking the sides of my thighs like a carpet beater. It’s suddenly very crowded in the downstairs loo.

  ‘Who is it, and why’s he there? It feels weird having him watch me while I pee …’ says Nate.

  I stare at the picture: at the long hair, the leather trousers and the arrogantly handsome face.

  ‘It’s Jim Morrison,’ I reply. ‘He’s from a band called the Doors, and they recorded a song called the “Hyacinth House”. I’d thought perhaps Becca was over-stretching to assume the cottage was named after it, but it looks like I was wrong …’

  Lizzie pushes to the front of the crowd and gazes up at Jim. Poor dead Jim, one of the brightest stars of his time, now performing in front of an audience of three (four if you count the dog) in a very small lavatory.

  She closes the wooden lid and climbs up on it, so her face is right next to the photo.

  ‘Nate!’ she says, passing him her phone. ‘Take a picture! This is so cool – Becca did me a playlist that had the Doors on it. That song about people being strange. Come on, Nate, I can’t stand on the bog all day. Take the bloody picture!’

  She does that strange fish-like pout that seems to be a legal requirement of teenagers’ photos the world over these days, and Nate takes the picture.

  ‘Is that for your Instagram account?’ I say, as she clambers down from the toilet lid. There’s a brief pause, where she looks twitchy and nervous and then tries to hide it. Caught between being a little girl who doesn’t want to get into trouble with her mum and a rebellious teen who wants to stick two fingers up at me.

  I remind myself of what Becca said and remind myself that she was right – Lizzie didn’t want to come here and I did, in fact, force her to. If the only thing she has power over is taking crazed selfies and embarrassing pictures of me, I can live with it – it’s a shedload better than an eating disorder, that’s for sure.

  I’m interested to see which way she’ll go, and can almost hear the cogs turning in her brain. In
the end, she just shrugs, face neutral – not apologising, but not being aggressive either. Clever girl.

  ‘Yeah. Is that all right?’ she asks. She obviously knows now that I’ve spoken to Becca, and may be feeling a little anxious about my next move. Carefully, I also maintain a neutral face. We’re both trying very hard to be Switzerland, here, which is perhaps the best we can hope for.

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say. ‘Apart from taking photos of people who aren’t in the family. Like Matt. If you do that, you ask their permission to share, okay? You can’t invade people’s privacy like that. It’s not respectful.’

  She nods, agreeing to my terms, and I feel jubilant inside. Like I have negotiated a peace treaty that has ended all conflict in the Middle East, and should now be made the chairman of The Entire World.

  ‘Mum!’ shouts Nate, sniffing the air, ‘I think that toast is burning again …’

  Aaagh, I think, dashing out of the toilet, tripping slightly over the dog’s arse and running towards the kitchen. Perhaps being chairman of The Entire World can wait until I’ve mastered turning bread brown without starting a fire.

  I give up on the toast and we all eat cereal. Cherie has kindly left us a little welcome pack of butter, milk, coffee, a few other bits and bobs. Plus a giant box of Sugar Puffs, which is strangely enough the kids’ favourite – an excellent guess from the mysterious Mrs Moon. I scoff down a huge mug of black coffee, and Nate and Lizzie guzzle some orange juice before disappearing off upstairs to get dressed. We have a couple of hours before we need to be at the café and plan to go and explore.

  Having failed to cover all the mirrors up the night before, I was forced to confront myself in the bathroom after my shower. That resulted in a hefty spray of Frizz-Ease before I dried my hair, and a very light application of some tinted moisturiser. As a result, I look almost presentable and am dressed in some khaki shorts and a green T-shirt, along with a pair of Birkenstock sandals that were probably in fashion several years ago.

  I take the precaution of hooking Jimbo up on his lead as we head out, just in case he decides he’s a puppy again and does a runner, and he ambles alongside us, at a plodding pace I use as an excuse to go slowly myself.

  We start with a stroll through the woods at the back of the house, which is a pretty magical place. The canopy of the trees is so dense that only a few rays of sunlight manage to creep through and dapple the mossy ground beneath our feet, and the only sound is birdcall and the bubbling of a nearby stream. It feels very isolated and mystical, almost as though we’re in our very own private rainforest, even though I know the cottages are only five minutes away.

  We do a loop, following a circular footpath that’s dotted at all the junctions and forks with garden gnomes. Each gnome seems to be doing something different – fishing, clapping, playing what looks like a ukulele – and each one has a wooden sign next to it on a stick, bearing a few words of gnomish wisdom in colourful speech bubbles. One says ‘the path to the cottages’; another says ‘the way to the falls’. One is holding little binoculars, and his sign says ‘the trail to the distant coast’. An especially jaunty fellow wearing a red beret tells us to follow the ‘road to San Jose’, but I think that one might be a joke.

  Nate and Lizzie are fascinated by it all. Honestly, it’s as though they’ve never seen trees before. Everything seems to take on huge significance – a giant fern still dripping with morning dew; the hollowed-out trunk of an oak big enough to squeeze inside; faded pink bunting hanging from overhead branches, as though someone has been having a party; a patch of wild mushrooms that Lizzie swears is the spitting image of David Cameron’s face.

  Nate isn’t quite old enough to have totally developed his sense of cool yet, so seeing him running around isn’t as much of a surprise. He still plays football on the street and likes to go to the swings.

  But seeing Lizzie let go of her teenage diva image for even a few moments is a complete and unexpected delight. She’s running and jumping and exploring, and taking photos of everything, and I don’t even care when she takes one of me as I lean down to scoop up one of Jimbo’s giant poos in a plastic bag. At least it shows I’m a responsible dog owner.

  Eventually, we follow the advice of the fishing gnome and follow the path back to the cottages. The sunlight as we emerge from the deep-green shelter of the woods is quite dazzling and I turn my face up to the sky. I like the sun. It makes me feel better. I remind myself to make sure the kids get coated in suncream before we come out again, it’s that warm.

  Our cottage is right next to the swimming pool. We peek through the windows of the pool and see that it is small but perfectly formed. There is already a family inside, the water is bobbing with inflatables, and the dad is pretending to be a shark, chasing screaming primary-age children around while the mum looks on and laughs.

  They look really happy and I quickly walk away. I don’t want to feel jealous. I don’t want to feel like I’m missing out. Not today. Today, I want to feel thankful and hopeful and strong. I want to feel like Katy Perry in the Roar video, although I don’t share that image with the kids – they might actually die laughing.

  ‘Mum, look!’ says Lizzie, bounding back towards me, returning from her advance scouting party beyond the path. The pool and our cottage are the only buildings at the back of the complex, which is actually really nice. We’re not just here for a week on holiday, we’re here for ages, and the location means we’ll have more privacy. You know, for when we have all our wild parties.

  I follow her down the path, and back through to the central lawn we saw when we arrived last night. It’s much prettier in daylight, with a big circular bedding area in the middle that’s full of luscious flowers; deep red dahlias, multi-coloured begonias, delicate sweet peas, the purple trumpets of petunias.

  There’s a water feature in the middle, some kind of mock-Victorian affair that looks like a shower for fairies and elves, and pretty lilac clematis is trailing all around it. It’s the kind of effortless-looking gardening that actually takes a huge amount of effort.

  I’m all right at gardening. Ours back home isn’t huge, and I gave up on a decent lawn years ago due to Nate’s incessant footballing and Jimbo’s pee patrols, but we have lovely borders and beautiful hanging baskets and a few trees that produce more apples and pears than we need every year.

  David was always my slave labour, doing the weeding and digging and turning over and hefting bags of fertiliser around, while I was the evil mastermind. One of my more realistic ‘moving on with life’ plans was to get an allotment. It’s still a good idea – I’m just doing the ‘insane relocating to Dorset’ plan first.

  ‘What?’ I ask, failing to see what’s got Lizzie so excited. It certainly isn’t a nice clematis, I know that much. I glance around at the cottages circling the lawn. Some are much bigger than others, and the tiny ones look quite higgledy-piggledy, but they all have features in common. Each has a little path leading up to the door, each has a name plaque, and each has a beautiful hanging basket in a riot of colour.

  ‘This!’ she says, as she points frantically at one of the cottages. ‘Look at what it’s called!’

  I squint slightly in the glare of the sun, and try and make out the writing on the slate plaque adorning the pale stone wall of the cottage.

  ‘Lilac Wine?’ I say, looking a question at her. It’s a weird name, but I’m not sure why it’s got her quite so bothered.

  ‘It’s a song, by Jeff Buckley!’ she says, snapping a photo of it. ‘We were listening to it in our music class. By lots of other people as well, but his is the best.’

  She skips over to the adjoining cottage, bats away a few bees hovering around the hanging basket, and takes a photo of that one as well.

  ‘And this one,’ she says, ‘is called the Cactus Tree … don’t you think that’s odd, too?’

  I nod. Because it is. Hyacinths and lilacs I get as names for Dorset cottages – but cactus? Not so much.

  We stroll along, Lizzie and Nate
exclaiming at the weird names of the cottages, her taking photos of each and obviously planning a long session on google at some point or another to solve the mystery. We pass Poison Ivy and the Laughing Apple and Cherry Blossom Road and then Mad About Saffron, which immediately strikes a chord with me.

  ‘I think I know that one!’ I squeal, obviously more infected with the excitement than I realise. And yes, obviously, I need to get out more.

  ‘What is it?’ squeaks Lizzie, bounding back towards me. Her hair is loose and wild and untainted by product, and it makes her look about five years younger. It’s only the eye liner that reminds me she’s a teenager at all.

  ‘Is it a band?’ she says, practically pogo-ing on one leg.

  ‘It’s a song, by … by …’

  She looks at me expectantly, and I feel the pressure mounting. This is my chance to prove I’m cool, and I’m about to blow it. I start to hum the song, fragments of the chorus coming back to me. It was on an advert, I’m sure.

  ‘I’m just mad about Saffron …’ I sing, badly. I can’t remember the next line, so I go back to humming, and Lizzie is looking increasingly agitated as I fail to fulfil her quest for knowledge.

  ‘It’s … it’s.… oh, lord, I can’t quite get it! It’s there in my brain, just give me a minute! It’s by …’

  ‘Donovan,’ says a voice from behind us. ‘Mellow Yellow.’

  I whirl around to see Matt, the man from last night. He’s wearing a pair of faded denim shorts with big pockets on the side, and no top. Again. He clearly doesn’t own many shirts.

  He’s a bit sweaty, as though he’s been working, and I notice things about him I didn’t notice the night before. Like the fact that his brawny shoulders and back are really bronzed, as though he spends a lot of time outside. Like the tiny crinkles at the corners of his hazel eyes, and his very long lashes. Like the way the sun glints on the chestnut shades in his hair. Like the fact that he has really, really big hands.