A Year in the Château

by Sarah Long

  ‘Beth will take my place, she’ll be great – completely up to speed on the vegetables and she’s looking forward to working off the stall. She says her favourite toy as a child was a cash register and she can’t wait to play with a grown-up version.’

  ‘I like Bett, but I prefer you.’

  A car pulled out suddenly in front of them and Jean-Louis slammed on his brakes and sounded his horn.

  ‘Oh la vache! ’

  ‘That’s such a weird expression,’ said Nicola. ‘Oh, the cow! Why do you say that?’

  He looked across at her.

  ‘I don’t know, it’s just something we say.’

  ‘Keep your eyes on the road.’

  ‘Did you see the car he was driving? It’s a sans permis, with a very small engine and maximum speed of forty-five kilometres an hour. You can drive one without having a licence, which means they are usually driven by people who should not be allowed on the road.’

  ‘Sounds dangerous.’

  ‘Mostly it is old people, but also it is drunks who have had their licence confiscated. But what can you do? In the countryside, everyone must have wheels or they are condemned to the life of a hermit.’

  The sun had risen by the time he pulled into the taxi rank in front of the station, where there were fewer passengers than Nicola expected; it seemed the French did not embrace commuting with the same zeal as the British.

  ‘Promise me you are coming back – the château needs you,’ said Jean-Louis, as he took her suitcase out of the boot. He watched her until she was on the platform and when she turned round, he waved and she waved back.

  *

  It was less than two hours to Paris and as she stepped off the train at the Gare Saint Lazare, Nicola felt lonely and out of place. The station was buzzing with purposeful men and women dressed in grey and black; she remembered how she and Dominic had remarked upon it on their last visit, how averse Parisians were to colour. They had stayed in an apartment on the Ile Saint Louis for their tenth wedding anniversary, a converted chambre de bonne at the top of seven flights of stairs. ‘No wonder they are all so thin,’ Dominic had said, ‘dealing with that every time they pop out for a baguette.’ The room was cheap and bohemian, and they spent the weekend like students, drinking wine out of tumblers, wandering the streets and sitting down at unpretentious bistros whenever they were hungry. Not a single museum, they were proud to say; they had enough of that in London, shepherding the children around at weekends, good parents that they were.

  As she stood in the taxi queue, running through her memories, Nicola was struck by the cold realisation that she was now a widow. A veuve, like Veuve Cliquot champagne, the widow spider, spending her widow’s mite on a Eurostar trip to London. Last time, returning for Dom’s funeral, she had booked the ferry with Gus and Maddie because it was cheaper, but now she was alone, she could take the train like a self-indulgent single person, with only herself to think about.

  It was a short ride to the Gare du Nord, along narrow streets flanked by beige buildings of uniform height with high windows and those large doors that looked ancient but sprang open with contemporary edge when you entered an electronic code on a keypad. They had visited a French friend for dinner on their first trip to Paris and failed to ask for the code, resulting in a long wait on the doorstep in the pre-mobile phone age.

  Nicola took the glass lift at the Gare du Nord, elevating her above the commuter platforms to the rarefied level of the Eurostar terminal. She recalled the tunnel opening, the Queen and President Mitterrand cutting the red, white and blue ribbons in Calais before hopping into the royal Rolls Royce and taking le shuttle back to England. Happier days, before political spats and nationalist rhetoric reappeared to dissolve the entente cordiale.

  She settled into her comfortable seat, opposite a middle-aged couple. The woman with Surrey blonde hair wore a fur-trimmed pink jerkin and her companion was in red trousers and a green striped shirt – there was more colour between them than in the whole of Paris. Nicola noticed they were holding hands and decided they were almost certainly not married to each other. Which inevitably led her thoughts back to Dominic and Flora. It was the standard corny destination for un dirty weekend – what were the chances? She’d never know now whether their stay on the Ile Saint Louis was the last time Dominic went to Paris or whether he’d created more recent memories without her.

  *

  ‘Thank you for coming, Mum,’ said Maddie. She had surprised Nicola by opening the front door when she heard the key in the lock.

  ‘I thought you’d be at work,’ said Nicola, putting her keys in her pocket and hugging her daughter tightly. She stepped back to study her face. She looked peaky, no doubt about it.

  ‘I took the day off; I couldn’t face it. They were quite nice about it – staff care is high on their priority list.’

  Like most of her graduate friends, Maddie described herself as a consultant. Not a medical consultant, as Nicola had to explain to her doctor friends; she was a management consultant, but the ‘management’ was quietly dropped these days, the way that ‘merchant bankers’ had morphed into ‘bankers’. Nicola had no idea what Maddie’s job entailed, but she was fiercely proud of the determination she put into it.

  ‘So, let’s put the kettle on and you can tell your old mother all about it,’ she said, slipping out of her coat and settling down on the familiar sofa. How often she had sat in this very position, waiting for Dom to come home from work. She could imagine him right now, bouncing through the door.

  She watched Maddie making the tea and they chatted about the journey – small talk before getting down to business.

  Then Maddie brought two cups over to the sofa and set them on the coffee table. She flopped down beside Nicola and folded herself into her mother’s shape, leaning into her side the way she used to when she was a little girl, when she would close her eyes and wait for Mummy to make everything all right.

  ‘It was completely out of the blue,’ she said. ‘John was lovely when Dad died, really caring. I was so grateful to have him there looking after me and knowing we’d be together through everything. Then last week, he just came home one evening and I was serving up a tofu katsu and he went all formal on me. Said it was all too soon, he felt he was turning into his father, it was like being a middle-aged couple, when we’re only in our twenties. He said – and this really upset me – obviously he loved me but he wasn’t ready to settle down, it was just him, it had nothing to do with me. Which is bollocks, of course. What he really meant is he doesn’t want to settle down with me.’

  Nicola felt a stab of indignation as she saw Maddie’s lip trembling. How could anyone not want to settle down with her daughter? She was about to deliver a stinging list of John’s faults – to reassure Maddie that she was better off without him – but then thought better of it. She’d done just that when her sister split up with her long-term boyfriend and then they’d ended up getting back together and married. It had been awkward ever since.

  ‘Are you sure he wasn’t just having a wobble? Sounds like an early midlife crisis to me.’

  ‘Midlife crisis? He’s only twenty-nine!’

  ‘I had you when I was twenty-nine, it didn’t feel very young to me, but then your generation do things differently.’

  ‘It was his idea for us to live together; I was quite happy as we were, but then you said you were moving away so it seemed the logical next step for us to cohabit. Though that makes it sound like a cold decision, which it wasn’t. I love him, Mum, and I thought he loved me.’

  Her lip was trembling again.

  ‘I’m sure he does,’ said Nicola soothingly. ‘He’s always seemed very devoted. Like when he brought that fresh ginger and lemon over when you had the flu – that’s the sort of attention I appreciate, never mind champagne and flowers.’

  ‘He’s never bought me flowers.’

  Nicola couldn’t help putting this down as a black mark, in spite of what she’d just said.

 
‘Remind me how long you’ve been together,’ she asked. ‘Two years?’

  ‘Two years since we had the “exclusive” chat. I know you laugh when I call it that. And we’d been dating for a few months before that.’

  ‘Call me old-fashioned, but I do struggle with modern dating etiquette.’

  ‘You are old-fashioned. Pretty much all my friends met their partners on Tinder. We went to a wedding last month where the groom said in his speech that it was love at first swipe and none of the old people knew what he was talking about.’

  ‘That’s quite funny; I would have understood it.’

  ‘It was a great wedding, we all got completely wrecked on shots and the bride passed out during the karaoke.’

  ‘Very romantic.’

  ‘It was, actually. Then John started talking about what kind of day we should have when we eventually get round to it, trying to decide whether to go full English countryside or Tuscan hilltop village. He wanted two best men or possibly three, and thought I should have at least six bridesmaids because you might as well go the whole hog, no half measures . . .’

  Her eyes were sparkling as she described the scene to her mother, conjuring up the wedding fantasies that she and John had been spinning between them. Then her face grew serious again.

  ‘And now he’s dumped me. What do you make of that?’

  ‘I think dump is a . . . let’s say it’s an unhelpful turn of phrase,’ said Nicola carefully.

  Maddie was looking away from her mother now, unwilling to meet her gaze.

  ‘And there’s something else I have to tell you,’ she said, addressing the wall behind Nicola’s shoulder. ‘I didn’t want to talk about it over the phone.’

  They say a mother always knows and Nicola anticipated the words before Maddie delivered them. She thought of how she’d known the terrible news Jean-Louis had to deliver before he opened his mouth. She had the same sense of foreknowledge now. Some things were too big to be contained by words.

  ‘I’m pregnant.’

  *

  Maddie was upstairs sleeping, giving them both time to gather their thoughts. Nicola had been in this position on a professional basis countless times: a distressed young woman in her consulting room seeking her advice on how to proceed following a positive test. This time it was personal, but she couldn’t even let herself have an opinion until she’d heard Maddie’s wishes. She could only say to Maddie what she always said: It’s your decision; only you can know what you want.

  The house seemed smaller to Nicola than she remembered; her sense of scale had evolved since moving to the château. This wasn’t her first return visit to the family home, but on the last occasion she had been so dazed by Dominic’s death that she hadn’t noticed anything. Now she moved around the kitchen, refamiliarising herself with the cupboards and noticing some new acquisitions – a Nespresso machine and a NutriBullet mixer that Gus’s vegetarian flatmate Alex had installed. The spice cupboard was well stocked as ever and she set about preparing a chicken curry for supper.

  ‘There you are,’ she said, as Maddie entered the room. ‘I’m putting a curry together for us. Gus says he’ll join us later. Does he know, by the way?’

  Maddie nodded.

  ‘I told him yesterday. He was sweet. Kept referring to himself as Uncle Gus, though I told him that was inappropriate at this stage.’

  ‘Yes, it’s very early days – luckily, you still have plenty of time. And what about John – does he know?’

  Nicola had been wondering whether the unexpected pregnancy was behind John’s sudden vanishing act.

  ‘No. I’d only just done the test and then, when he said he thought we should break up, there was no way I was going to tell him. If he thought we were moving too fast already, can you imagine how he’d feel about a baby?’

  ‘That’s right. It’s better to decide on your own. A woman’s body is hers and hers alone.’

  Maddie looked at her blankly.

  ‘What do you mean, decide?’

  Nicola put down the knife she was chopping onions with. This was not what she expected.

  ‘I mean, decide what you want to do about the pregnancy,’ she said gently.

  Maddie looked appalled.

  ‘What I want to do about it?’ she repeated. ‘You mean, you want me to consider an abortion?’

  ‘I want you to think about your position, that’s all. I’m just giving you the same advice I’ve given to countless patients . . .’

  ‘I’m not your patient, I’m your bloody daughter! And I’m carrying your potential grandchild, in case you haven’t registered!’

  Her grandchild. Nicola suddenly realised that a huge part of her would love Maddie to have the baby. New life in the family after death. But she couldn’t let herself say that – she must remain true to her medical code of conduct.

  ‘Mum, I’m having this baby! She was conceived in love, and whatever happens, there’s no way I’m going to get rid of her – or him. I’ve always wanted children, and just because John’s being a jerk doesn’t mean I’m going to throw the baby out with the bathwater! This child is a gift – don’t you see that?’

  Oh God, thought Nicola, she really means it.

  ‘It’s all right, darling, I can see you’ve made your mind up, don’t upset yourself.’

  ‘You think that’s a bad decision – don’t you? I can tell! You’re a weird kind of grandma who doesn’t even want her first grandchild to be born.’

  ‘Now you’re being over-emotional, Maddie, which is quite normal with the hormones. You know as well as I do, it’s only a collection of cells at this point . . .’

  ‘Trust you, you’re a doctor!’

  ‘Yes, I’m a doctor, and once you’ve calmed down, you’ll know I’m telling you the truth. Whatever you decide is fine by me, but right now we are merely talking about a clump of cells.’

  ‘We are all just clumps of cells, only bigger!’

  ‘And with organs and fully formed brains . . . But anyway, let’s stop this conversation.’

  ‘What conversation is that, or can I guess?’ said Gus, coming into the room. He’d grown a man bun and beard since starting his PhD, and Nicola found it suited him. He gave her a hug.

  ‘Lovely to see you, Mum. Or should that be Granny?’

  He looked over her shoulder at Maddie.

  ‘I presume you’ve shared the news?’

  ‘Mum thinks I should get rid of it.’

  ‘Maddie!’ said Nicola. ‘I didn’t say that. I didn’t mean that at all.’

  ‘But she’s agreed it’s my decision. So whether she likes it or not, she’s going to be a grandmother.’

  It was really happening. Nicola was suddenly overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.

  ‘We are a grandmother,’ she said weakly.

  ‘What do you mean? Who is “we”?’ asked Maddie.

  ‘It’s what Margaret Thatcher told reporters outside Downing Street after the birth of her grandchild. Roundly mocked because of the royal “we”’.

  She was to be given a grandchild. What an extraordinary blessing to come out of all the turmoil and grief of the last few months.

  ‘Come here, both of you!’

  And she put her arms around her children and cried tears of joy.

  *

  ‘I honestly thought you’d want an abortion,’ said Nicola. ‘That’s why you thought I was being so cold – I had to remain rational and keep my feelings at bay.’

  The three of them were sitting around the remains of the chicken curry, then Gus stood up to clear the table.

  ‘To be honest, I did think about it briefly,’ said Maddie. ‘It would certainly have been the easier solution. But I soon realised it was out of the question.’

  ‘And now I can allow myself to become properly excited,’ said Nicola. ‘At last, here’s something for us all to celebrate. It’s just so sad your dad will never see the baby . . .’

  She would have loved him to be here for
this, could imagine his face lighting up with pleasure when he heard the news.

  ‘I suppose I should start knitting,’ she said brightly. ‘The last time I picked up my needles was when I was pregnant myself. I made a beautiful white shawl, which I took to the hospital, then forgot to bring home – that was hundreds of hours of my life I never got back.’

  ‘Crafts are very in,’ said Maddie. ‘My friend Lizzie goes to a patchworking evening class.’

  ‘When will you tell John?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘If he hadn’t already done a runner, this would seal the deal, I reckon,’ said Gus cheerfully.

  ‘Gus!’ Nicola reprimanded him.

  ‘I wish Dad was here,’ said Maddie. ‘I miss him so much. He would have been very excited. Do you remember he once said he’d give twenty thousand pounds to whichever one of us produced the first grandchild? But I suppose that was before you spent every last penny on the château!’

  ‘I don’t think he was serious,’ said Nicola. ‘He was just feeling broody after a colleague brought her baby into the office.’

  ‘He was a great father,’ said Maddie. ‘What about that treehouse he built us in the garden – do you remember, Gus? With a rope ladder? If he was still here, he could build another one for the baby.’

  ‘Oh yeah, I can really see a baby climbing up a rope ladder,’ said Gus.

  ‘When the baby’s older, I mean.’

  ‘Mum,’ said Maddie. ‘It must be horrid for you being without Dad. He was pretty much the perfect husband. I know I’m biased but he obviously was.’

  ‘We were very happy together,’ said Nicola, in two minds about whether she should share her recent findings. She decided against it for now, unwilling to burst the bubble of the children’s adoration. That could wait for another day.

  ‘I miss him terribly, of course, and it’s been difficult to adapt, but that’s where I’m lucky. Instead of rattling around on my own, I’m surrounded by friends, and they’ve all been so kind. And I’m keeping busy with the market gardening.’

  ‘A fine hobby for an old woman,’ said Gus. ‘You were always happy to get your hands dirty. I used to love picking strawberries with you.’