Coming Up Roses

by Rachael Lucas

  ‘Drink this. You’ll feel better, I promise.’

  Brisk and not cosily maternal, her mother’s expression suggested she was just as concerned as her dad, but in her own way. She reached out, patting Daisy on the knee.

  ‘You’re welcome to stay here, darling, while we’re away. You can have a go at getting this garden back into shape, if you like.’ She brightened at this as she spoke. ‘It’s always good to get your teeth into something when you’re feeling a bit blue. A project will do you good.’

  Numbly, she’d agreed, allowing herself to be shipped up to bed like a child, obediently taking a towel and some overnight things. Her dad had brought her up a mug of cocoa.

  ‘Just like I used to do when we were back home in Oxford,’ he smiled.

  She’d lain there all night, face aching with all the tears she’d shed. Jamie had been so funny, and vibrant, and charming, and such a lying snake. What was she going to do without him?

  Having shared the tale, Daisy sat back, chin in her hand, with a sigh.

  ‘’We might think we’re looking after our garden, but of course it’s the garden that is looking after us’,’ said Thomas, with a kind look. ‘I’m not going to say any such nonsense about being young, or there being plenty more fish in the sea, or any of that. But time – and a spot of gardening – heal most things, I’ve found.’ He placed his mug down on the table.

  ‘Now let’s get back to it.’

  Chapter Seven

  Daisy heard Elaine’s laughter as she headed through the stone archway of the Grey Mare. After a long day in the garden, she was really looking forward to a drink and some food – and despite her previous misgivings, to a chat with Elaine and Jo. It was fun working alongside Thomas, but she was beginning to crave company in the evenings. It was a good sign, she recognized – she must be getting back to some kind of normality.

  ‘There you are. We’ve ordered some Pimm’s.’ Looking up with a smile, Jo reached across the table, taking the waiting glass from the enamelled metal tray. She tipped in the jewel-red mixture with a splash of ice and fruit, handing it to Daisy as she collapsed into the wooden chair.

  ‘I needed this.’ Daisy took a mouthful, closing her eyes blissfully.

  ‘Long day?’

  ‘I got up at six. I’m trying to get as much done as I can before the Open Gardens.’

  The cottage two doors along from Orchard Villa was one of the stars of the show, it turned out, and Daisy realized that in its current state, her house was going to be seriously letting the side down. With Thomas’s help and a lot of long days, they’d made a real difference. The hedges were neatly trimmed, the rose arch over the gate showing the first signs of flower buds.

  ‘And she’s done wonders in my place,’ said Elaine. ‘She’s a bit of a hit with my readers, too.’ She gave Daisy a smile. It had been a real thrill to see her first blog article go live on Elaine’s site, and she’d found herself hooked on refreshing the page, watching as readers from all over the world commented on her words and Elaine’s beautiful, artistic photography.

  ‘I could do with someone to come round to mine to have a go at the back garden,’ Jo said, thoughtfully. ‘I’ve been trying to bribe Martha to cut the grass, but it’s pretty fruitless trying to get a fourteen-year-old to do anything she doesn’t want to.’

  Remembering their own teenage years, they all laughed.

  ‘I’ll nip in and get a menu, shall I?’ Daisy scanned the tables nearby, but there were none to be seen. She was ravenous, and the smells wafting out from the pub kitchen window were making her stomach growl.

  ‘The burgers here are to die for – have you tried them?’ Jo gave a groan of anticipation.

  Daisy, who’d already sampled the magic that was a simple bucket of chips, could well believe it. Her stomach gave another warning rumble. ‘Back in a sec.’

  As ever, there was a group of commuters propped up against the bar, suits on, having a quick drink on the way home. Daisy slipped in amongst them, reaching for one of the hand-written menus, which stood on the counter. As she turned, she felt a hand on her shoulder.

  ‘Daisy, hi.’ It was Thomas’s vet friend from the other day. He was standing waiting to be served. The woman behind the bar passed him over a velvet-black pint of Guinness, condensation streaming down the side of the glass.

  He raised it towards her with a look of relief, and took a long drink.

  ‘Ned.’ She smiled in recognition.

  ‘Sorry.’ He indicated the glass, wiping a moustache of foam from his upper lip. ‘Been a long day. Well, to be honest, they’re all long days. I’m bloody knackered.’

  Daisy returned his smile.

  ‘Can I get you a drink? Are you—’

  ‘Oh – no, I’m here with friends. Just outside.’ She waved in the direction of the beer garden.

  ‘Of course.’ He shook his head slightly, a baffled expression on his face. ‘Village life. I forget everyone knows everyone around here.’

  ‘Not me,’ said Daisy, simply. ‘I hardly know a soul. This is the second night out I’ve had since I’ve been here.’

  Ned rubbed his stubbled chin, absent-mindedly. Unlike their first meeting, he wasn’t covered in straw, but Daisy noticed there was a hole in the sleeve of his jumper, and the cuff had a piece of yarn hanging loose. He looked like he needed a long sleep, and a good meal. His green eyes were underset with dark shadows. Daisy was half-tempted to invite him round for lunch one day, look after him a bit.

  ‘That makes me feel a bit better. It’s been nothing but work for me. By the time I get to bed I’m asleep in seconds. Whoever thought being a vet was glamorous?’

  ‘Well, that’s what happens when you’ve got to keep the boss happy, I guess.’ Daisy pulled a sympathetic face. ‘I’d better get this menu back, the girls will wonder where I’ve got to.’

  ‘Course, yes. Sorry. Sorry. Off you go.’ Ned took another mouthful of his beer. ‘Maybe see you at the next meeting? Doesn’t look like we’ve got much chance of getting out of it, even if we did beat a hasty retreat last time.’

  Daisy nodded, turning away with a smile. Much as she didn’t want to get caught up in Parish Council business, she didn’t want to let Thomas down. At least with Ned there, there’d be at least two of them below retirement age.

  ‘I’ll see you there.’

  ‘Look forward to it. Well, that’s not strictly true,’ said Ned with a rueful smile. ‘But – oh, you know what I mean.’ He raised his eyebrows over his pint glass.

  Daisy laughed. ‘I do. See you soon, Ned.’

  ‘Did you get lost?’ Elaine and Jo were both looking perplexed as she returned, menu in hand.

  ‘I got chatting, sorry.’ She spread the menu out on the table.

  Jo leaned forward, tucking her long blonde hair behind her ears thoughtfully.

  ‘I don’t know why I bother looking,’ she said, sitting back again. ‘I have the same thing every time.’

  Daisy, who was ravenous, would have happily ordered and eaten one of everything, but settled on a chilli burger with a side serving of fries. Elaine chose a salad.

  Waiting for the food to arrive, relaxing in the last of the sunshine, they sat chatting, getting to know each other a little better.

  ‘So what made you decide to train as a counsellor, Jo?’ Elaine sat back in her chair, flipping a beermat back and forth.

  ‘I sort of fell into it, really. When Martha went to preschool, I wanted to do something – I was going mad stuck at home, and having come straight out of university into antenatal classes, I hadn’t had much of a chance to make friends. We were living in Slough, near my parents.’ Jo gazed skywards, remembering.

  ‘Oh, so you haven’t always been in the village?’ Daisy held her glass up to the light, absent-mindedly swirling the ice back and forth. Impatient for dinner, she’d already picked out the strawberry and cucumber and eaten it.

  Jo shook her head. ‘No, we moved here a few years back before Martha started secondary
school. Our catchment school was enormous and pretty terrifying, and we’d spent summers here in the village when I was a child. My great-uncle had a cottage on the other side of the railway.’

  Elaine put down her glass, looking pleased. ‘Oh, how funny – I did just the same. We spent every summer here with my grandparents. Our paths probably crossed as children.’

  ‘So go on,’ said Daisy, who wanted to hear the rest.

  ‘Oh yes.’ Jo slid the jug across the table towards Elaine, who tipped the remains into their glasses. ‘So I ended up volunteering as a Samaritan, and it snowballed from there. I took a couple of part-time courses, and one thing led to another. I qualified a few years back.’

  ‘And you work at Elaine’s husband’s school?’

  ‘Brockville are very hot on pastoral care.’ Elaine repeated her comment from their previous meeting, as if she’d read the prospectus. ‘When Leo took over as head eighteen months ago, they’d just taken Jo on.’

  ‘I do a couple of mornings there a month. Mainly group work with some of the kids.’

  Daisy had discovered Brockville while out walking Polly. A huge, rambling Victorian building, it had been a private school for many years. Parents from all over the county trundled down the little lane and through its wrought-iron gates every morning, children bundled into the back of glossy Range Rovers and expensive convertibles. It was a far cry from Daisy’s colourful concrete primary school back home in Oxford.

  The food arrived just then, the young waitress setting down the plates with a cheerful smile.

  ‘So you must be pretty sorted, then, being a counsellor?’

  Jo gave a snort of laughter. ‘You’d think, wouldn’t you. Unfortunately self-development’s a bit of an ongoing process.’

  Elaine shook her head, swallowing a mouthful of salad before she spoke. ‘It’s absolutely not for me,’ she said with a shudder. ‘I like my skeletons well and truly locked up in their cupboards.’

  ‘Funny you should say that.’ Jo put down her fork, resting her chin in her hands.

  ‘Go on,’ said Daisy, leaning forward with interest.

  ‘I’ve been doing some reflective work recently – we go over our practice with supervisors, talk about how we could have done better, things like that . . . and there’s a pretty big thing standing in my way.’ She cast her eyes down, taking a breath, and helping herself to the drink that had just appeared on the table.

  Jo’s voice was low. Daisy and Elaine leaned in, listening intently. Jo took another sip of her drink and continued.

  ‘All the way through university I had a really close-knit group of friends. One of them, though, was my best friend – Tom Fox. We did all the same courses, spent all our time together.’ She sighed. ‘We had a massive falling-out the day after graduation, and we haven’t spoken since then.’

  ‘What’s to stop you getting in touch? He’s probably on Facebook, isn’t he? Have you looked him up?’ Elaine reached for her handbag, ready to pull out her phone.

  ‘I don’t – no, don’t look.’ Jo’s pale face looked panicked suddenly. ‘Martha was born not long after I graduated from university. Nine months, to be precise.’

  Daisy looked at Jo, frowning. ‘So she’s –’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you’ve never told him?’ Daisy realized she’d blurted it out, but – ‘What on earth did you fall out about?’

  ‘Oh, God.’ Jo shook her head again. ‘Graduation night. We all got drunk, crashed at a friend’s place. After four years of being just good friends we ended up in bed together. Next morning I woke up and told him it was a mistake.’

  ‘And don’t tell me,’ said Daisy sagely, feeling like an expert on men. ‘His pride was wounded.’

  ‘Completely. He and I had always fought like brother and sister because we were so similar. And I was as stubborn as he was. So we headed back home – me to Slough, him to Manchester, and we just didn’t speak again.’

  ‘And Martha?’ Daisy speared a tomato.

  ‘I didn’t realize I was pregnant. Thought my periods were just a bit erratic and by the time I twigged, I was almost five months gone. Picking up the phone to Tom seemed impossibly hard then, so I just . . . left it.’ Jo twisted her hair up in a knot, her brow furrowed at the memory. ‘Life got in the way. Next thing I know, I’ve got a fourteen-year-old who wants to know why she doesn’t have a dad named on her birth certificate, and I’m wondering how to reconcile myself with being a counsellor who’s living a lie.’

  Daisy reached across, squeezing Jo’s hand. She wasn’t the only one who needed this friendship, it seemed. Jo caught her eye in thanks.

  ‘You poor thing. What a burden,’ said Elaine.

  ‘Talking about it’s only the first step.’ Jo picked at her burger, which had lain untouched while she’d spoken. ‘I really need to bite the bullet at some point and get in touch.’

  ‘Well, that bit’s easily remedied. That’s what Google’s for,’ said Elaine, reaching again for her phone.

  ‘Oh, I know where he is – or at least I’ve half an idea. He’s quite a well-known poet. I saw one of his poems in a newspaper review recently – it was all about lost friendship and half-forgotten memories . . .’ Jo looked away, flushing slightly.

  ‘Oh.’ Daisy felt a wave of empathy for Jo.

  ‘Yes. And I – this might sound a bit silly, but I thought for a moment it might have been about me.’ She took another large mouthful of her drink, looking into space, lost in thought.

  Elaine was tapping rapidly on the screen of her phone, brow furrowed in concentration. ‘Tom – Fox, you said?’

  ‘Yes.’ Jo looked half terrified, half relieved that Elaine had taken it out of her hands. She sat back, releasing the twist of hair from her hand so it fell down over her shoulders in a curtain of pale white-gold.

  ‘Nothing on Facebook – but then he’s a poet, that’s not really his market,’ said Elaine, expertly. ‘Hang on, I’ll check Twitter, all the writers waste time on there . . . aha. What d’you think?’ Elaine slid the phone across the table.

  Jo didn’t move for a second. Daisy leaned in to look at the tiny square profile photograph. He appeared to be crouching in the picture, one dark curl flopping forward over his eyes, battered jeans and a grey shirt on – she peered more closely – and stroking a cat. It all looked very artistic.

  ‘Amsterdam,’ read Daisy. ‘Very poet-ish sort of place to live.’

  Jo plucked up courage and reached across, picking up the phone cautiously.

  ‘Oh!’

  Daisy gave her knee a little squeeze of reassurance.

  ‘What d’you think?’

  ‘He hasn’t changed a bit. Oh God.’ Unconsciously she ran a hand through her hair, wrinkling her forehead. ‘And somehow I look every day of thirty-five. I bet he’s got a glamorous Dutch girlfriend called Mariette or something.’

  ‘You do not look anywhere near thirty-five,’ said Elaine, firmly, taking the phone back and tapping something in the search bar. She frowned at the screen for a moment, lips pursed in concentration, scrolling downwards.

  ‘Nope,’ she concluded, putting the phone down on the table so they could see another photo with a paragraph of text underneath. ‘Single, according to an interview he’s done on this poetry blog. And –’ she looked at Jo with a reassuring smile, ‘no children.’

  ‘Well, none that he knows of.’ Jo exhaled, closing her eyes. ‘That’s something, I guess. Because God knows what’s going to happen when I open up this whole can of worms.’

  She’d almost finished her drink and reached for the jug, absent-mindedly, an expression of surprise flitting across her face as she registered it was completely empty.

  ‘It’s not going to be easy,’ said Elaine. She looked across, seeing the waitress bringing out a tray of food to the table nearby. Pointing at the jug, she mouthed a request for another before turning her attention back to Jo, who sat clutching her empty glass.

  ‘That’s an understatement.’ Jo g
ave a wry smile.

  ‘But you’re doing the right thing. Martha’s old enough now to deal with it, and hopefully to understand a bit about why you didn’t tell her before.’

  Daisy had been trying to imagine how it’d feel to deal with something that size at fourteen. She’d been convinced that she was old enough to be treated as an adult back then. Now she was twice that age, she still didn’t have a clue how to behave.

  ‘I think I’ve got a good idea how she’ll react,’ said Jo, with a grim expression. ‘Explosions, huge teenage angst, and no doubt it’ll all be my fault.’ She raised an eyebrow.

  ‘But you have to hold onto the fact that you did the best you could at the time,’ said Elaine, reaching across to squeeze Jo’s knee in comfort. ‘That’s all we can ever do.’

  Jo bit her lip thoughtfully, looking at Elaine with a curious expression.

  ‘You sound like you know what you’re talking about.’

  Elaine shook her head, a half-smile playing on her lips. ‘Skeletons in cupboards, darling, remember. I keep mine locked away neatly. Ah, lovely.’

  The waitress reappeared, bearing a full jug of Pimm’s, breaking into their conversation. Just at the right moment, Daisy thought. Whatever mysteries lay behind Elaine’s perfect facade were staying well and truly hidden, and that was clearly just how she liked it.

  ‘Cheers,’ said Jo, topping up their glasses. ‘I really appreciate you two being here for me.’

  ‘That’s what friends are for.’ Daisy smiled back at her, realizing as she said it that there was real feeling behind the clichéd phrase.

  ‘And when Martha hits meltdown point, you can come and let off steam to us. I remember being pretty hideous as a teenager – but my sister Miranda was a million times worse.’

  Jo looked thoughtful. ‘I’m not sure Martha’s really going to explode. I’m more worried she’s going to be really hurt – we’ve been so close, always. And this feels like – no, it is – a massive betrayal of her trust.’

  ‘Well, we’ll hold your hand.’ Daisy looked at her steadily.

  ‘We will,’ agreed Elaine, pushing her plate away, her meal half-eaten. ‘You know, sometimes it’s easier to share things with people who don’t know anything about your past.’