‘I don’t want to talk about Ginny.’ Pru didn’t know why she’d said it aloud, but she had.
Christopher pulled away from her. ‘You’re right, of course. I’m sorry.’
‘No, Chris, I’m sorry.’ She put her hand on his arm, which he patted. It felt brotherly, conciliatory and made her stomach twist.
Ten minutes later, Christopher made his way downstairs as Pru gathered up her overnight bag and prepared to leave. A small crowd congregated to say goodbye and offer their condolences. She watched the dark, shuffling procession approach Isabel and one by one give their love and prayers, and then they turned to her. She didn’t feel like being civil to any of them, no matter how well intentioned. She hurt too much.
She gazed at the heavy-lidded girls and slightly sloshed boys and she couldn’t help but think of Megan, who hadn’t been invited. Megan, whoever she was, this ghost of a girl that appeared and disappeared, with her words that dropped like cluster bombs, heaping confusion and sadness on top of the grief. This girl who was invisible, irrelevant and yet purportedly carrying a child that had the blood of the Fellsley family running through its tiny veins. But even if Pru could have got the facts straight in her head, it wasn’t her place to tell.
It took an age to say goodbye. Pru watched as William’s relatives crushed his friends and colleagues into their arms, taking comfort from the connection of sorts – another young person, like him, but not him. Christopher caught her eye across the room, giving her an almost imperceptible wink that made her heart leap. ‘It’ll be okay, it’ll all be okay.’ It told her that he too wished they were elsewhere; free to laugh, talk and continue where they had left off before this tragedy robbed them of momentum. She felt instantly guilty at the happiness that surged through her body on this of all days.
7
Pru didn’t have the luxury of taking to her bed and wallowing in her grief; she had a business to run. The distraction was actually good for her, focusing her mind on something other than her loss. Although, in truth, concentrating on the minutiae of cake-making was difficult.
It was a busy afternoon at Plum Patisserie. She placed her teacup on the desk in front of her. The subtle lighting and tawny hues made the room seem homely and cosy; clients felt more like they were joining a friend for coffee than transacting business. The chairs in front of Pru’s desk were wide and comfortable, the kind you could sink into and snooze in without too much persuasion. The vast ornate mirror behind her desk made the room appear larger than it was and in the winter the log burner gave the whole room a feeling of intimacy.
‘Was dreadfully sorry to hear your sad news, Pru,’ Lady Miriam said as she gulped her coffee.
‘Thank you.’ Pru gave a brief nod. She found it difficult to accept condolences, knowing that if she gave in to sentiment, the floodgates would open and she would be sobbing again. ‘So,’ she drew proceedings back to business, ‘it’s a cake for your daughter’s birthday and she will be…?’
‘Yes, my daughter Bunny and she will be fourteen.’
‘Smashing, and do you have an idea of the kind of cake you are looking for, Miriam?’
Lady Miriam lapped at the cup of strong coffee and spoke through her mouthful of scone. It fascinated Pru that for all her fancy labels, privileged upbringing and pricey education, the woman still hadn’t learned what a rap on the knuckles had taught Pru aged three, that a mouth full of food equalled no talking. Pru tried to listen to her words, but it took all her strength not to stare at the wet blobs that flew from her mouth and landed on the blue blotting paper in front of her, creating something that resembled an aerial shot of the Galapagos.
Pru had noticed that many of her wealthy clients seemed to calibrate differently what was polite or acceptable. She recalled one Chelsea hostess who shot her assistant a withering look when she called the downstairs cloakroom ‘the toilet’, but seemed to find it perfectly natural to use her bare hands to retrieve a turd from the rug, left by her rather highly strung Pomeranian. Pru had fought the urge to be sick and, unable to refuse the offered handshake at the end of their meeting, had rushed home to scrub her palm before spraying it with a liberal application of bleach.
Lady Miriam considered her response. ‘I think I know what I want. Well… I do and I don’t!’
Pru was aware that today her train of thought was fractured, her voice a monotone, but she nodded and picked up her pencil. She could go through the motions even if she couldn’t muster any enthusiasm.
‘What would really help would be if you could give me an idea of a theme, a colour or anything that Bunny is particularly fond of – for example tennis or horses?’ Pru was usually on safe ground with these two pastimes. ‘Anything at all as a starting point and then we’ll get Guy to come up with some concepts and samples that we can go through before making a final decision. How does that sound?’
Lady Miriam smiled. ‘It sounds fabulous!’
Pru had learned over the years that her customers fell into two categories. There were those who picked up the phone and asked for a birthday cake, with minimal instruction. ‘Something pretty, please. It’s for my mother’s eightieth and there’ll be thirty guests.’ Pru would then deliver the cake and send an invoice. In return, along with the payment, she would usually receive a brief but sincere thank you note, written on crested cream vellum. And then there were the others, who figured that as they were paying very large sums of money for extraordinary cakes, they should be involved in the intricate and time-consuming business of design, production and finish. For them, the more stages to the whole process, the better; they loved to meet over coffee, often with urgent requests for minute changes.
By the very fact of her presence, it was clear Lady Miriam fell into the latter category. She waved her arms over her head. ‘I see the cake as the centrepiece, the wow moment! I want everyone to arrive and walk around it, almost in homage to Bunny reaching this incredible milestone!’ Lady Miriam’s hands finally came to rest under her chin.
Pru wanted to point out that becoming fourteen was not usually considered an incredible milestone and that if this is what they were preparing for her fourteenth, what would her twenty-first look like? She gulped at this thought. Bobby would never have a twenty-first, not now. She bit back the thousand comments that wanted to surge from her throat and instead described her vision of a huge flowery cake scattered with tiny rosebuds and real gypsophila wound in, with variegated petals and teensy iced bows whose ribbons would flow over two tiers.
Would Bunny appreciate it? she wondered. She and Milly had savoured every mouthful of their own childhood birthday cakes – always a giant Victoria sponge, the middle filled with raspberry jam and buttercream frosting. They only ever received a single gift, of course – something useful like socks, mittens or knitting wool.
Guy knocked and entered and gave a sweeping bow in the direction of their customer. ‘I am so very sorry to interrupt—’
‘Oh, no, don’t worry a jot. We haven’t got down to the detail yet.’ Lady Miriam sprayed Guy with scone. Pru saw him give an almost imperceptible flinch.
‘But I am afraid Madame is needed upstairs in a rather urgent fashion.’ He held his hands in front of his chest as though cupping a small bird inside his finger cage.
Sometimes the way Guy spoke drove Pru mad; this was one of those times. She wished he would be a bit more to the point. It was hard to tell from his demeanour and tone whether the building was on fire or they had run out of soap in the Ladies’ loo.
‘Do excuse me, Miriam; I’ll be as quick as I can. Guy, if you could fetch our guest another coffee.’ She knew this would sweeten her absence.
They walked outside and into the corridor. ‘What on earth’s wrong, Guy?’
‘There’s a girl upstairs that says she needs to talk to you. She refuses to come inside and is sitting in your private doorway, but she can be seen from the café, hunched on the floor like a vagrant.’ His nose wrinkled slightly.
Pru held her tongue. It
was more important to deal with the issue than stand and debate his lack of empathy. ‘Is she blonde-ish, small, pregnant?’
‘Yes, yes and yes.’ He nodded, looking up to his right as though picturing her.
Pru let out a breath that she had not realised she had been holding. ‘Thank God. That’s Megan. You’ll have to take over for me with Miriam.’
Pru hurried upstairs and walked out on to the Curzon Street pavement. It was late afternoon and a busy day like any other. Businessmen walked briskly, barking into mobile phones, arranging where to go for a drink or shouting instructions to their PAs. Ladies that lunched tripped along arm in arm with their doppelgangers, sporting matching designer handbags slung over their bony décolletages and seemingly in no hurry to get home. Tourists ambled along with cameras around their necks, clogging the narrow walkways and causing much irritation to the lunching ladies and the businessmen.
In their midst Pru spied the slender back of Megan, in the same T-shirt she had seen her in twice before. Her hair was loose and hung to her shoulders. She was bending forward as if resting on her knees. Pru approached cautiously, eager not to frighten her off again. She came to a standstill a foot away from her.
‘Hello there, Megan.’
The girl turned slowly and in obvious pain. ‘Hello.’
Pru gasped, and tried her best not to show her shock and distress. Megan’s bottom lip was swollen to twice its normal size, with a vertical split along it that oozed blood when she spoke. Her left eye was entirely bloodshot and encircled by a dark blue bruise. The lid itself was purple, shiny and swollen. She had to tip her head back slightly to get a full view.
‘Oh my God, what happened to you?’
‘My cousin’s flatmate, he—’
‘A man did this to you?’ Pru interrupted, unable to keep the anger from her voice or hide the shock on her face that anyone could do this to a young, pregnant girl.
Megan shook her head vigorously and then held her jaw, regretting the ill-considered movement. ‘No, Rocky is as good as gold; he lives with my cousin, Liam. I’ve known him a long time. It was his girlfriend.’
Pru crouched down on the pavement and put her hand on the girl’s back. ‘Oh, Megan. Do you need to see a doctor or go to the hospital? I can take you.’
She shook her head, more gently this time. ‘No, it’s just my face.’
‘But we should still get you checked out, just in case.’
‘I don’t want to. I’m okay, honestly.’ Her words were slurred, issued through her freshly misshapen mouth.
‘But you’re clearly not okay, love. Why did she do this? When?’
Megan spoke slowly. ‘She came back to the flat last night, pissed up, and said she was sick of sleeping on the sofa while I was in Rocky’s room. The two of them were arguing in the hallway and I just lay under the covers, listening. Rocky said he felt sorry for me, that he didn’t mind me having his room and that was it. She went mental, said he was probably shagging me.’ She closed her eyes. ‘It was horrible and I felt really sorry for Rocky, he was getting all that grief just because he was doing me a favour. So I went out into the hallway, to try and tell her there was nothing going on and that they could have the room and I’d sleep on the sofa, but before I got a chance to say a word, she went crazy. She head-butted my face and punched my mouth. I think I blacked out a bit; I managed to get back in the bedroom and when it had all calmed down, I packed up my stuff and I left. I can’t take any more hassle.’
‘When did you leave?’
‘About four o’clock this morning.’
Pru looked at her watch: it was nearly 5 p.m. ‘Have you been walking around all this time?’
Megan nodded. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t have anywhere else to go and then I remembered what you said and so I came here. I don’t have to stay, I just didn’t know what else to do.’
‘I’m glad you thought of me, Megan. Come inside, come on.’ Pru reached inside her pocket for her door key.
Megan stood and seemed to weigh up her options. She prodded her bottom lip with her thumbnail until it bled, then licked the warm trickle back up into her mouth. ‘I probably shouldn’t have come. I don’t know what to do.’ She bit the inside of her cheek, which reminded Pru so much of Bobby that her stomach cramped.
‘It’ll be okay, Megan. Trust me. You can come and stay with me, there’s lots of room and it’ll give you a bit of space, time to get straight.’ Pru hoped Milly would be kind.
‘How can I trust you? I don’t even know you.’
‘That’s true, but I know what it’s like to need a break. And besides, I don’t think you’ve got too many options at the moment, have you?’
‘It still feels weird.’
‘Yes, it is a bit, but this whole situation is weird. And here’s the thing, Megan: you look like you are in a bit of a pickle, and I want to help you. I haven’t always been as lucky as I am now, and the one thing I can tell you is that there are certain times in your life when people will offer to help you, often when you need it the most, and you should always, always take that help.’
‘I’m not sure.’ Megan’s glance was nervous, flicking between Pru and the street, her means of escape.
Pru could see her indecision. ‘I tell you what, why don’t you come inside with me and have a good think about it. There are no bars on the windows, you are free to leave the second you want.’
‘I wish I hadn’t bothered you now, I feel really awkward. This is all bollocks – you were that girl’s aunty and finding out about her is the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.’ Her tears fell. ‘I didn’t get the chance to say goodbye to him properly because you arrived and I hadn’t finished. It was like you chucked me out and you didn’t really have the right. All I wanted was five minutes to tell him what I would do with our baby, that I’d keep all the promises we made, but I never got the chance.’
Pru patted her shoulder. ‘I didn’t chuck you out, Megan, you ran away. And he knew how you felt. Don’t you worry. He loved you and he knew.’ She swallowed the bile of disloyalty that rose in her throat.
Megan hesitated, then seemed to come to a decision. ‘What can I do with my stuff?’
‘How much have you got?’ Pru pictured the wardrobes, chest of drawers and closet in the spare room of the flat.
‘Just that.’ Megan pointed to the pavement and a shallow plastic box that took up no more space than a couple of large books.
Pru’s heart lurched in sympathy. ‘You can bring it upstairs.’ The sort of women she dealt with at the patisserie every day would be busy stocking up on baby essentials at this stage of their pregnancy and ordering towers of cupcakes in pale pink or sky blue for their baby shower. She doubted Megan even had a change of clothes. Pru resolved there and then to order her a range of stuff, from maternity wear to smart clothes. She’d have it delivered and Megan could pick what she liked.
On top of the box sat a photograph of Megan and William. They were lying on a pebble beach; Megan’s head was resting on his chest and William, with one arm keeping her close and the other holding the camera at arm’s length, had clearly taken the photo. They were both smiling. It shocked Pru to see him in this environment and with this girl. Where had Bobby thought he was? What lie had he told? Pru studied William’s face: he looked happy. She inhaled sharply, squinting to better analyse his expression. He didn’t just look happy, he looked happier than she had ever seen him. Slotted into the corner of the frame was a black and white picture, only a couple of inches in diameter but unmistakeably a scan of a baby, their baby.
‘That was at Brighton. We liked it there. It’s where we met – I was wandering along, minding my own business and he nearly ran me over on the seafront, that’s how we first got talking.’ She sniffed up her tears and her mouth twitched. ‘After that we’d go in all weathers, go for a walk and then get fish and chips and eat it in the car.’
Pru absorbed this new chunk of information. Megan sitting in the car that Bobby drov
e, the car in which she collected him from the barracks, visited his mother, sang along to their favourite songs and planned her wedding. The car in which they had died.
‘How long were you and William seeing each other?’
‘A year and four months.’ Megan’s face crumpled.
Pru did the maths: three months longer than he had been with Bobby.
‘I should have known someone like me was never going to end up with someone like him. I mean, look at me, I’m just nothing.’
Pru shivered to hear the familiar words that she herself had uttered throughout her childhood. It was more than she could bear. ‘You are not just nothing, Megan.’
‘Can I ask you something?’ Megan looked Pru in the eye. ‘Can you not call me Megan? No one calls me that. I’m Meg. When you say Megan it makes me feel like I’m in trouble and I’m nervous enough as it is.’ Her mouth lifted with the beginnings of a smile.
Pru nodded as she pushed her key into the shiny brass lock and turned to her guest. ‘How you doing, Meg?’
The girl gripped her plastic box tightly. ‘I’m okay.’ Her knuckles were white against the lid. She was petrified. ‘Do you own the whole building then?’
‘Yes. We have the bakery, kitchens, workroom and office in the basement; the showroom and café are on the ground floor; and there are two flats above – mine and Milly’s, and Bobby’s. And a room in that is yours for as long as you need it.’
Meg stepped forward and touched her fingers to the glass as she stared at the tall bow window. Its shock of red velvet fabric fell in a cascade of waves from the ceiling and over a table on which sat the most incredible cake she had ever seen. It was illuminated by dozens of flickering candle bulbs in antique brass lanterns. The cake was eight tiers high and each tier was separated by minute pillars of faux marble. The pristine white icing was covered on one side in tiny red sugar-paste rosebuds and petals that looked so real you could almost smell them. Green leaves with intricate vein detailing and lifelike jagged edges had been scattered here and there. Some poked from behind clusters of buds, others appeared to have withered and fallen. The tiny blooms looked as if they had been thrown and landed against the sponge; some looked as if they were about to fall to the tier below. They reminded Meg of confetti that had been gathered up by the wind and blown somewhere new. It was a work of art.
A Little Love Page 10