Edie May is one of my favourite customers and she is pretty much a complete mystery to me as yet. It’s been a busy day and we’ve sold out of everything other than a few chicken avocado sandwiches and the leftovers from the barbecue.
The weather, after a brief and gloomy hiccup, is back to being glorious and Willow has been running the grill all afternoon.
The scene outside the café is very similar to the first time we visited, but to me it all feels very different. I don’t feel like a visitor any more, for a start. Despite only having been here for a fortnight, I already know a lot of people, by face if not by name.
I know where everything is; I have mastered the cash register, and even have my very own chalkboard for my ice-cream milkshake specials. I also have a reasonably good grip on Cherie’s VIPs.
I know that Scrumpy Joe Jones, for example, had an Italian grandmother and spent several childhood summers in Pisa. Hence the biscotti.
I know that Surfer Sam doesn’t just eat pot noodles, he also likes an Irish potato dish called colcannon that I’ve learned how to cook for him.
Bit by bit, the mysteries of the comfort food have been revealing themselves to me in all their tasty and emotional glory.
But one of the things that I still don’t know is why Edie May always takes an extra portion of food home with her, and how she can possibly have a fiancé.
Edie comes in two or three times a week and has a tiny suntanned face that looks like a raisin. Her hair is white and closely cropped to her head and she’s approximately the height of an Oompah Loompah.
She’s talked openly about the party she had for her ninetieth birthday, but she still seems to live independently with the support of nothing more than a crook-handled walking stick. Every time she comes in, she chats about the weather and what she watched on television the night before, and about the goings-on in the village. She loves fruit loaf and gingerbread and reading large-print romances from the library and Anton du Beke off Strictly Come Dancing (‘such a gentleman!’).
Edie has the more pronounced West Country accent that a few of the older folk have, but she says ‘fiancé’ with a great deal of care and style, enunciating every syllable until it sounds like a foreign word. Which I suppose it is, now I come to think about it.
Today, after the barbecue crowds have cleared and Willow and Cherie are cleaning up, she’s still here, perched on a stool next to the counter, walking stick propped up next to her, entertaining me with a big long speech about farm animal behaviour and what it tells us to expect in the weather.
‘An’ that,’ she says, triumphantly, ‘is why you should always take your brolly when they’re all packed together, like – because sheep in a huddle, tomorrow a puddle!’
She waves one bony finger at me as she announces this piece of wisdom, as though warning me against disagreeing with her. As if I’d dare. I hand over the boxed cake and ask her if she wants anything else. She eats like a bird when she’s here, pecking away at tiny amounts of food, so I always secretly hope the extra portions she takes back for her ‘fiancé’ are actually for her.
‘No, my love, that’ll do me just grand, it will. My fiancé will be right happy with that!’
She carefully stands on her feet and tucks the box away in the backpack she always wears. The rest of her looks like pure old lady – sensible walking shoes, tights even when it’s hot, a beige cardigan – but the backpack is fluorescent orange and has a VANS logo on it. She’s very proud of it and told me Cherie bought it for her for Christmas – I suspect as much to provide her with a bit of hi-vis protection as anything else.
I wave goodbye and watch as she takes small but steady steps towards the door, neon backpack over her frail shoulders.
Cherie passes by, a bin bag full of rubbish in her hands, and pauses in front of me. Her hair is in a giant wispy bun, so big you’d assume there was a donut beneath it if you hadn’t seen it all loose. Her skin is glowing from the heat and from the effort and her cheeks are rosy on top of the tan.
‘You all right, Laura?’ she asks. ‘You look a bit … what’s the word? Wistful?’
‘It’s Edie,’ I reply, reaching out and taking the bag from her so I can take it through to the bins at the back. ‘She always has that effect on me. What is her story, Cherie? With the others, I’ve kind of found out myself, bit by bit, just from getting to know them over the last couple of weeks. But with Edie, I never want to ask.’
Cherie grabs a bottle of cloudy lemonade from the fridge and plonks herself down on the stool that Edie has just vacated.
‘You’re right not to, darling. She’s a robust woman, but only in certain ways. Edie got engaged when she was twenty, to a local lad called Bert. Or Bernard – there’s not really anybody left who remembers it that clearly, even that old codger Frank was too young to have paid much attention. Anyway, the story has it they were deep in love and he asked her to marry him while he was on leave from the navy.
‘This was around 1944, something like that. Well, again, I’m not sure of the details, but he never came home from the war. His ship was sunk by a U-boat somewhere in the Atlantic. We lost a lot of local lads, like everywhere else back then – my parents told some terrible stories of those ‘regret to inform you’ telegrams getting delivered in the village, everyone looking through their windows praying the knock didn’t land on their front door. Awful.
‘Anyway, the love of Edie’s life never came home, and neither did a body – and by all accounts, it broke her heart. She never accepted he was dead and, over time, became more and more convinced he did come home after all.
‘She carried on through her life, working at the library for most of it, looking after her parents when they got old, but she never let go of the idea that Bert was still with her. Most of the time she’s completely normal, but occasionally, if you catch her at home on a quiet night, you’ll hear her talking to him. And as you know, she takes home food for him too. To her, he’s as real as day and has been for as long as I’ve known her.’
I am a bit stunned by this story and stay quiet for a moment or two while I try to process it. Essentially, Cherie is telling me that Edie became unhinged by grief as a young woman, which I completely understand, and has lived for decades with the delusion that her dead fiancé is waiting for her at home. And that he likes pistachio and white-chocolate cheesecake.
‘Shouldn’t she have had … I don’t know, some help?’ I ask, frowning. ‘Been taken to see a doctor? Had some therapy or bereavement counselling?’
‘Bereavement counselling! No such thing during a war, I suspect, Laura. Everyone’s just expected to keep calm and carry on, aren’t they? And as for therapy, my love … well, you’re young. You don’t understand the times we’re talking about here. This was the dark ages in comparison to now. She might have been shipped off to an asylum and the therapy may well have involved electrodes getting attached to her forehead!
‘No, that’s not the way it was handled at all and I can completely see why. We all talk about mental health problems now, or at least more than we used to back then. There’s not the same shame or stigma attached to it, people are generally less ignorant. But back then? They would have said she was tapped in the head, and she’d have probably spent her whole life in an asylum, at least until everyone was kicked out of them and expected to fend for themselves.
‘Instead, she stayed here. Everyone looked after her – not that she really needed it, mind. You’ve met her – she’s wonderful. If I’m anywhere near that active when I’m her age, I’ll be tickled pink. She worked her whole life, she cared for her family, she still helps out on the village committees. She organised summer fayres at the school and drove the mobile library van round to the farms. After she retired she carried on working as a volunteer. She doesn’t just function, she contributes.’
‘But she’s …’ I struggle to find a word that I feel comfortable using, one that doesn’t sound too awful, but Cherie doesn’t give me the chance.
�
�Mad as a hatter? Well, aren’t we all, in our own way? I know I’ve had my moments and I’m betting you have as well, my sweet.’
I stay silent and reluctantly recall all the times I’ve lain in a snivelling heap sniffing a dead man’s dressing gown, or talked to a photo and imagined it replied, or sat in the passenger seat of a car holding an imaginary hand, or called David’s now-defunct mobile phone, still somehow hoping he might answer, or send me a text from heaven. Yep. I’ve definitely had my moments – but they haven’t lasted a lifetime. Not yet, at least.
Still, it’s enough to make me realise I’m in no position to judge. So what if Edie May takes cake home for her long-dead fiancé? It’s not as though she’s doing anybody any harm. And, in fact, she’s led a full and useful life, is fit as a fiddle, and still walking up this hill at ninety.
So I stop disagreeing and simply nod. Things are done differently here and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I get it.
‘I hope she eats the spare cake herself,’ I eventually say, signifying my getting of it, and start to wipe down the counters. There’s nothing much left in the chiller cabinet, so I decide that today would be a good time to clean out the shelves. I start to pull the salad containers free and head towards the kitchen.
‘Don’t get too carried away with all that housekeeping, my love!’ shouts Cherie as I retreat. ‘And don’t you forget we’re going out tonight!’
Hah, I think, as I scrape the leftovers into the food recycling bin – Frank collects it ‘for his porkers’ – as if I’m going to be allowed to.
Because while a whole village has quite happily allowed Edie May to indulge her delusional solitude for an entire lifetime, I have been here for just two weeks and am already being dragged out from under my rock.
Tonight, I am going out for dinner. A proper, grown-up dinner, at a restaurant, wearing a dress and everything. It is the first time I’ve done this for quite some time, unless you count those family-friendly pubs where you get a free colouring sheet and some blunt pencils with your burger and chips.
Willow is babysitting – or ‘coming round to hang out’, as we have phrased it to Lizzie – and I will be joining Cherie, Frank and Matt at an Italian place in Lyme Regis.
It is only the presence of the first two names that is stopping me from freaking out completely.
Chapter 16
‘I like that dress,’ says Lizzie, as I walk downstairs and into the living room. I automatically turn around to see who she’s talking to and realise that it’s me.
‘Um … thanks?’ I reply. ‘I’ve had it for ages. Wait … were you being sarcastic and I didn’t notice?’
‘Mum! You don’t have to always be so suspicious!’ she replies, pulling out her phone and raising her eyebrows at me. I strike a somewhat awkward pose and she takes the shot.
‘Come on, ballbag,’ she says to her brother, who is staring at the TV as though he’s never seen Top Gear before. I am about to reprimand her for swearing when she holds up one hand and adds, ‘It’s an old Dorset word, Mum. It’s a term of endearment.’
I remain completely unconvinced of the truth of this statement, but am amused enough by her antics that I let it slide. Nate is dragged to his bare feet and he comes and squeezes in for a Lizzie-directed selfie. Her direction mainly consists of telling me my hair’s too big to fit in, but eventually it’s done. She even shows me the end product and it is lovely.
‘You look really pretty, Mum,’ says Nate, before he slouches back down on the sofa. He spent the afternoon at Frank’s farm helping out – in return for a tenner – and is exhausted. And smelly. I’m pretty sure Frank didn’t really need the help, but Nate was keen to go and see the place, and it kept them both out of trouble. Plus that tenner means five less ice-creams for Mum to buy, let’s face it.
Lizzie has also been demonstrating an enterprising streak, working with Scrumpy Joe’s son Josh at the family ‘cider cave’. I’m a little worried about my teenage daughter working in a cider cave, but have been reassured by both Joe and everyone who knows him that there is no way he will allow Lizzie to get high on her own supply. According to him it’s because he’s a responsible adult and according to everyone else it’s because he’s too mean to give anything away for free.
She’s been handing out his marketing leaflets to tourists and helping them sort stock. She’s also been murmuring about his ‘lack of online presence’ for a couple of days now, so I wouldn’t be surprised if poor Joe gets dragged kicking and screaming out of his cave and into the twenty-first century sometime soon, whether he likes it or not.
‘Yes, you do look pretty,’ adds Lizzie, reaching out to tuck my hair behind my ear. My hair is crazy and there is no controlling it. ‘Where are you going again? And who are you going with? And when will you be home? And how will you be getting home? And are you sure you have some credit on your phone?’
I open my mouth to answer her before realising that she actually knows all of this already, she’s just messing with my head by giving me the same speech I usually give her.
‘Ha ha,’ I say, checking my bag for essentials – cashcard, lipstick, phone, packet of Rennies. Always best to be prepared for an antacid emergency.
There is a knock on the door and Lizzie opens it to find Willow on the doorstep. I feel guilty having her here babysitting, knowing as I do that she rarely gets a night away from her duties at home. She works at the café and cleans the cottages for Cherie, and seems to spend the rest of her time with her mum. When she has a night away from all that, she should really be spending it out with friends or having a rave, or even just down the Horse and Rider in the village.
‘Yo!’ she says jauntily, giving me a salute as she walks through, pink hair bouncing on slender shoulders. She is dressed like some kind of space punk from the future and I realise she reminds me of Milla Jovovich in The Fifth Element. Her elderly Border terrier, Bella Swan, scoots past us and into the living room.
Bella Swan is something of a canine femme fatale and Jimbo immediately gets up on creaky legs and comes over to lick her ears. She endures it, then wanders off to curl up on the dog bed that was previously his.
‘I have both Zoolander and Dodgeball on DVD,’ says Willow, as she passes me. ‘Ben and Jerry’s ice cream in my bag and I will call you if there are any problems at all. No, I don’t mind doing this, no, you don’t need to thank me yet again, and naturally I will feel free to help myself to anything in your fridge.’
As I have yet to utter a word or ask a single question, that’s a pretty comprehensive reply. I wrack my brains to come up with something to add, but fail.
‘All right. Thanks. Again.’
She gives me a hug and heads through to the living room. She knocks Nate’s feet off the sofa and plonks herself down, scratching Jimbo’s head with her foot. Lizzie appears from the kitchen with three dishes and spoons and, without even asking, puts the first movie into the DVD player.
I stand there looking at them, dogs and humans all splayed in various positions around the room and wonder if it would be all right for me to stay there as well. The curtains are closed, the lights are off and it all looks very … cosy. Very safe. Very comfortable. I’d much rather lurk in the background here or have an early night than go out for dinner. In fact, I’d probably rather sit on a pissed-off porcupine than go out for dinner, truth be told.
I’m very much enjoying my time in Dorset. I’m making new friends, I’m learning new skills and I’m gaining experience that will make my CV look much better when I get back to the real world and go job-hunting in Manchester. The kids are having all kinds of fun, haven’t uttered the words ‘I’m bored’ once since they got here and look glowing and healthy from all their time outdoors. Even Jimbo’s having a good time, or he is when he’s awake, anyway.
Crazy as this plan sounded when I first came up with it, it’s working. It’s working for all of us, in its own way. David, I know, would give me a huge thumbs-up and be super-proud of what I’d done. And he�
��d be pleased, I hope, at the way we’re all changing and growing – not forgetting him, but learning how to live better without him.
I still think about him every day. Probably every hour. But it is less with quiet desperation and more with affection and gratitude. Gratitude that we ever had him in our lives at all – I’ve said it before, and as I’m quite a predictable person I’ll probably say it again, but I do feel lucky to have had that kind of love. To have known that kind of closeness to another human being, to have shared that kind of connection for so long.
It was precious and it will always be cherished, and he will always be part of me. But bit by bit, day by busy day, I am feeling stronger. More able to treasure the past, more able to deal with the present, more able to imagine a future. The David-substitute dressing gown has stayed under the pillow most nights and I’ve found myself asking WWDD much less often. Instead, I’m trying to plough my own path and find my own way of doing things. To focus more on WW ‘I’ D instead.
All of that is good. Better than good – it’s excellent. I definitely feel more confident and a lot less isolated, and a lot less sorry for myself. Sharing the lives and stories of Cherie’s VIPs has really helped on that front – technically, of course, I always knew I wasn’t the only person in the world to have suffered a personal tragedy.
I know it’s a big, sometimes ugly, world out there. But in my world – the world of me and David and our friends and family – I was always the centre of attention, the star of the misery show. The poor little widow, struggling to adapt to life as a single parent.
Here, without that pressure, I feel more free to be just one more person in a crowd. One more person with a story to tell and pain to cope with, and challenges ahead – but not the only person.
Here, I feel accepted for who I am now – messy and uncertain, as that may be – rather than seen as a fragile creature to be watched over and worried for. I feel like more of a grown-up. Nobody here really knew the ‘old’ me, or ever saw me at my lowest – they don’t judge, or prod, they just accept. It’s unbelievably refreshing and, after two weeks of it, I feel so much more relaxed.
Summer at the Comfort Food Cafe Page 13