Check Mate

by Caron Allan

  At least it kept Matt too busy to worry about his bloody brother!

  Wednesday September 23rd—0.50am

  We had a lovely, almost normal evening. With Lill continuing to mend and no word as yet from any of Sid’s mates, there seemed little point in sitting around moping.

  When Sid returned from the hospital, the children were all in bed, and I was delighted when he suggested that Matt and I go out for the evening—and even more gobsmacked when Matt actually agreed.

  I heard Sid carefully locking up after us which was both reassuring and yet the sound of the loud click of the key turning in the lock gave me a cold lurching sensation in the pit of my stomach.

  As we walked to the garage, we both kept looking all around, and I could see Sid watching us from the utility room window. Even as we pulled the car out onto the drive and began to slowly roll away, we were craning our necks to make sure there was no one around. But the lane to the village was completely empty, there wasn’t another vehicle to be seen.

  We debated where to go. If we went to the village pub, we might be bombarded with questions about Lill, and I didn’t feel I could face that, so we decided to drive into Stow.

  We had a lovely dinner in an upmarket pizza restaurant. I could hardly believe we were ‘out’. And it was so, so good to chat about nothing but inconsequentials.

  We strolled hand in hand back towards the car. But it was only just after ten o’clock and I wasn’t ready to go home. Music filtered out from a pub, and the butter-coloured lights gilded the pavement, the voices of pub-goers within was softened to a warm murmur.

  “Let’s have a drink before we go home.” Matt suggested. I sighed happily. Perfect.

  In fact, it was he who had the alcohol and I who had the orange juice and the car keys, which was fine by me. I don’t knock back the bubbly like I used to years ago.

  A band was playing. Just some local band playing well-known pop songs, but it was just the thing to match my mood. Matt pulled me to my feet and drew me out onto the tiny crowded dancefloor.

  Bliss!

  Remember all those soppy things you do and say with that transient first Great Love? We did them. Is there anything as wonderful as a pizza dinner, a drink and a dance to cheesy pop songs in a pub after a terribly stressful and upsetting time?

  By the time the pub chucked out, Matt was gently tipsy and as snuggly as any of the children or cats.

  I’m sure he went to sleep in the car, but we got home quickly and I was relieved to notice everything was peaceful and quiet and nothing lurked among the trees.

  I turned off the engine and let my seat belt slide over my shoulder. I put my hand on the door handle, and felt Matt’s hand on my arm.

  “Dad said you said it’s your fault Mum’s in the hospital. He said you think you’re evil and that you destroy everything. I thought we already talked about all this?”

  I bit my lip. Not now. Not after our lovely evening! I didn’t know if I had the courage—or the energy—to pry open this particular can of worms. His grip on my arm tightened and I felt him shift in his seat so he was facing me. His arm went round my shoulders. The shape of the seats made it a less-than-cosy embrace, I couldn’t trust myself to speak but I managed to nod.

  “Cress. Cressida. How can you even think that?” he whispered. Tears burned in the back of my eyes; the dim interior of the garage blurred and swam. I still didn’t feel steady enough to risk speaking. He moved away and my shoulders felt cold without him. “Let’s go in,” he said.

  I gritted my teeth, praying I could hold myself together until he went to bed then I would be able to sit in the garden room and sob it all out.

  Sid came and let us in, then immediately ran off with a quick, “Sorry…” over his shoulder. Once we were indoors, Matt locked up and checked the alarm was on. There was the sound of a TV show from the family room—Sid was watching re-runs of ‘This Is My Shed’ again. It was a celebrity edition. Matt stuck his head around the door and said “All right?” to Sid who responded with the appropriate answer: a repeat of Matt’s question, “All right?” Matt re-emerged.

  I dithered in the hall. My fingers couldn’t manage the buttons on my jacket, suddenly seeming a lot smaller and hard to grip.

  “I’ll just check on the kids.” Matt said. I nodded. He ran up the stairs three at a time. I finally pulled my jacket off and went into the kitchen. I drank some water. The cats were sitting around, expecting a bedtime snack but for the first time ever I ignored them and went through to the garden room.

  I curled up in the corner of one of the sofas. After a moment or two I heard a slight sound and glancing up, saw Matt silhouetted in the doorway. He didn’t come over. I was quite glad. I hoped he would go upstairs and go to bed. If we could carry on fairly normally for a few more days, perhaps he’d forget what Sid had told him and slowly, eventually, we could get back to some kind of normal. And if things got better, and no more bad things happened, perhaps I could stop feeling the way I do.

  He pushed a mug of tea into my hands, and sat next to me, arranging a blanket around my shoulders. He put a box of tissues next to me—the same ones I’d shoved into Leanne’s hands recently, when she had been upset.

  The mug burned my fingers and I set it down, but at least now I was a little warmer. I hadn’t realised until that moment that I was shivering.

  Matt’s arm came round me and he drew me close. I didn’t sob. But tears broke free and ran down my face, onto the blanket and onto Matt’s jumper.

  “Listen to me,” Matt said. “you’re not a bad person. You are not something destructive and evil. And this accident of Mum’s, that’s not your fault.”

  “But it is…” I said. He hushed me with a kiss.

  “Shush. Your Lord and Master is speaking,” he said, and I couldn’t help thinking of Lady Christobel and Sir Reginald again. I nodded obediently, already feeling reassured. He continued. “You, Cressida, are a wonderful woman. You’re smart, sexy, beautiful, kind and loving. Maybe not as posh as you were when I first met you but that’s okay, we’ve mellowed you. What I’m trying to say is, you’re not a monster, Cress, you’re not a bad person. You do everything you can to protect the people you love, but you’ve got to stop blaming yourself. You are a wonderful person. You gave my parents a home when they had nowhere else to go. Then you took me in too, and then you took on Paddy and Billy and even for a short while, my sister. You don’t destroy, you create. You made a home, you created a family. Everything I have now, I owe to you—my home, my family, even my business, so don’t ever let anyone tell you you’re not a good person. You’re a friggin’ angel.” He added with a growl and I giggled in spite of the tears that were falling. We said nothing for a while, just sat in the darkness, then he kissed me again and said, “C’mon darlin’, let’s go to bed, I’m freezing my arse off. Poxy British summer!”

  I followed him out into the hall where we encountered Sid ambling in the direction of the stairs.

  “Nice evening?” he asked.

  “Yep,” we said.

  “Night,” he said.

  “Night,” we echoed, adding, “See you in the morning.” I don’t know why we say that, it’s a strange new habit I’ve picked up from those Hopkinses.

  And so we retired to bed.

  And it was evening and it was morning, and it was a new day.

  Thursday September 24th—10pm

  Feeling blissfully happy today. I feel as though I could float, feel so, so wonderful! All my fears gone—well, some of them. Obviously there’s still a teensy fly in the ointment of my life in the shape of Monica, but leaving that little problemette on one side, everything is just wonderful today. All those sweet, soppy things Matt said. My mind is completely at rest. It really does feel like a bright new day.

  Apparently there was a massive storm last night, not that you’d know it to look outside. The sky is a fresh, washday blue, the plants are revived, everything looks brighter and cleaner. It’s a whole new world out there.
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br />   The kiddies scampered to school—I can hardly believe there was ever a time when it was a battle to get either of them to go. And it’s almost the half-term holiday. I’m quite excited. I do hope Jess will be able to fit us in for a few days, I’d love to go up and stay with them for a while, we haven’t been up since last year, for our wedding. I remember the days when I wanted nothing more of a holiday than to lie beside a pool in some hotspot—St Tropez or Antigua or somewhere. Now all I want is to see our family and to have endless long days playing with the children. Perhaps we can manage a week or so at the seaside this autumn too?

  I’ve been thinking about what Matt said last night. About how I’m not as posh as I used to be. In many ways I think that’s true. Goodness knows I’ve suffered under the weight of his family’s working class influence for the last two years. I no longer speak as nicely as I used to—I use all manner of slang and colloquialisms that just a short while ago were completely alien to me. For example, I often say ‘cos instead of because. I know more about car engines than one would have thought possible for a Cheltenham Ladies’ graduate. And I have even (though only once) been to a karaoke bar. I’ve even had Chinese takeaway.

  So yes, I’ll admit that I’ve lost my posh.

  Having children doesn’t help either—it’s so easy to get into lazy ways, to take short cuts just to make life that little bit easier.

  Still. I can’t let myself slide too much. So I will make more of an effort to poshen myself back up. Obviously that’s not all about the inside of one—the outside could do with a bit of attention too. So I’m going to book myself a mani-pedi—it’s been absolutely months—and I will take Billy with me, the poor little poppet hasn’t done anything exciting for weeks and I don’t want her to grow up thinking life merely consists of dreary improving things and no fun at all.

  In fact—I know! We’ll put on our best frocks and go to London for the weekend and do a spot of shopping, have afternoon tea, and then go to the salon, all that sort of thing. That will be marvellous.

  And then once I’ve got myself back up to scratch, I can really apply myself to getting rid of that ghastly carbuncle Monica Zinnia Pearson-Jones, or whatever she is calling herself now, and do it from a position of posh power.

  Mind you, how many times have I said I would rid my life of her, and yet there she still is, alive and kicking and running people down and trying to ruin their lives?

  I see now I have let her kick the stuffing out of me when she ran me down last year. For all these months she has had the upper hand, even my abortive and disastrous trip to her house only made me feel as if she were the one in control of the situation. I have been running scared of her ever since last autumn, afraid of what she might do to me or someone I love.

  Well, never again! I realise, in fact, as I sit here, that Monica has become the new Clarice in my little world. I have allowed Monica to dominate my life and terrorise me in the same way that I allowed Thomas’s mother (there’s another instance of the Hopkins’ terrible legacy—my grammar has gone right out of the window) to make my life a misery a couple of years ago.

  But, I dealt with that situation—or rather, Thomas dealt with it for me—but if he hadn’t, I would have, I went there on the night in question fully intending to dispatch her. So if I can take on a whale of her order, I can deffo take on a skinny little pilchard like Monica, even with my duff hip slash knee.

  But I need a plan.

  That’s where I’ve gone wrong previously.

  When I wanted to get rid of Clarice, I worked it all out to the last detail beforehand. I did the same with Huw and what’s-her-name, and with Simon, and Desmond, and Billy’s Dad, whatever-he-was-called. I carefully planned, plotted and researched all their demises so that I knew what to do, how to do it and I could be reasonably sure nothing would go wrong. Which it didn’t. They are all good and dead, thanks to me and my clever project management. I mean, I even worked out the best place to park and everything.

  For some reason, I’ve never used this remarkably sensible and, some would say, obviously, essential approach whenever I’ve set out to tackle Monica. I’ve always just gone off half-cocked, I’ve let emotion and even fear cloud my judgement. But if I’m going to get rid of Monica at long last, I’ve got to return to that more methodical, measured approach. It’s the only way.

  Friday September 25th—8.30pm

  So, bearing in mind what I’d decided, I rang Jess last night and asked if it would be possible to go up for a few days in October, when Paddy is on half-term holiday. We had the most wonderful chat. How I have missed her good common sense and lovely, dependable, mumsy nature. After talking to her for an hour I felt as though I’d been in therapy for six months. It was a great deal more effective than the therapy I’ve actually been in. Not that I’ve bothered to go for about two months now.

  The upshot is, they’d be delighted to have us. You know, they have been so good to me, seeing as they are relatives of Thomas, and really Matt and the children—and even me—are nothing to them in terms of blood-relation. And yet nothing has changed, they are as lovely as they have always been. So nice to have relatives whom one doesn’t feel obliged to ignore or lie about.

  “As if you need to ask!” she said. How lovely. Of course, then two minutes into our conversation I remembered I hadn’t even broached the subject with Matt; there is always the possibility he might have other ideas about the trip—and of course, he and Sid might be up to their necks metaphorically speaking doing someone’s landscaping. So as soon as I’d hung up I had to go and check with him, half-expecting to have to ring Jess back and change the date. But no, he was happy with my arrangements.

  “But,” he said, “this time we’ll stop overnight somewhere to break up the journey for the kids.”

  What a sensible idea. The children were as sick as dogs last time, poor babies. Plus I don’t see Tom sitting still and being good for more than a couple of hours at a time.

  Okay. So action stations! I have my calendar, notebook, journal, Darcy the cat, a lovely cup of tea and some of Jacqueline’s white chocolate and crystalised ginger cookies, (Not a patch on Lill’s but any port in a storm. At least they’re not terrible.)

  Usually, in the old days with my darling first hubby Thomas, we went up to Scotland to Jess and Murdo’s for the shooting in August. But Matt doesn’t shoot, so we can be a bit more flexible about when we go up, plus the memories for me make a visit at that time of year very difficult—even though it’s also the time of year Matt and I got married. It makes things a bit easier for Jess and Murdo if we go at another time, as they can accommodate more guests who will pay a fortune to take part in the Glorious Twelfth shoot. So we will go up on Saturday October 24th, and stay for a few days then leave on Thursday 29th and reach home on Friday 30th so the children have a few days at home before going back to school and nursery. It would have been nice to be away from home right at the end of October, as obviously that is a time that also doesn’t hold the sunniest memories for me, after what happened last year, but I know I will need to face up to that and ‘get over it’, to use a phrase in common parlance. Right then, my plan is beginning to take shape: Working backwards as it’s easiest:

  30th October, arrive home.

  29th October, leave from Jess and Murdo’s.

  25th October, arrive at Jess and Murdo’s

  24th October leave home; arrange somewhere nice to stay approx.

  halfway between us and Jess’s place. And the same for the journey home again, obv.

  So it’s obvious that anytime in the early part of October is going to be just right for getting rid of Monica.

  I’m so excited! Just had to sit for a moment and let the reality of it all sink in. This is just like the old times, with all the lovely planning and thinking how I’m going to do it. I wish there was more preparation I could do right now, but I still don’t know how I’m going to actually—you know—do it.

  On a different tack, Sid has been talking about
taking Lill away somewhere for a holiday once her leg is out of plaster, so their plans and ours should dovetail nicely, as I’m hoping they will go after we come back from Scotland.

  Also, I’ve made the bookings for Billy and my weekend away together in London. That’s very exciting. But I shan’t tell her yet, like most children of her age, she doesn’t really understand the concept of time, and she’d think we were going now, then be disappointed because we aren’t.

  We’ve still heard not a peep from Clive and family. There’s no longer any other possibility—they’ve done a bunk. At least no one unsavoury has come looking for him, which is a mercy, but otherwise the event of their absence is shrouded in mystery. Sid is furious he hasn’t heard from any of his mates yet, either.

  Meanwhile Lill is coming on in leaps and bounds—not literally of course. She is having her leg put in plaster this afternoon and then, assuming all is well, she will be coming home tomorrow. Whoop whoop! It will be so, so wonderful to have her home at last, we’ve all missed her so much. Yesterday she was telling me how much she has missed the cats, and how she was looking forward to being “back in my own kitchen”. LOL. But I suppose she’s right—my name might technically be on the deeds, but I’ve never done much more than make toast or baked beans in that kitchen. From the first moment we saw this house, I knew the kitchen would be hers, all hers.

  Of course Lill won’t be able to carry out any of her usual tasks around the house, but she will be there at least to keep a sharp eye on the rest of us. So in many ways, it will feel as though things are finally getting back to normal. Paddy and Billy will be overjoyed to have her back at home with us. They’ve found it very strange that Nanna is sleeping at “that big funny housepeel” as Paddy calls it.