Sunshine at the Comfort Food Café

by Debbie Johnson

  I glance over, and see her and Van, still dancing. She doesn’t look unhappy. She looks thrilled to be out, to be dancing, to be here. Even with everything that’s happened to her, she’s never quite lost her joy at being alive and out in the world. Sometimes she misplaces it – but it always seems to come back, like a river that’s been dammed and diverted but eventually bubbles back to the surface, irrepressible and full of energy.

  ‘No, she doesn’t,’ I agree. ‘But it’s not that simple, is it? And we have no idea what will happen next with her.’

  ‘None of us do, my love. And believe me, I’ve seen people with Alzheimer’s over the years – my sister, God bless her, suffered terribly. So did my own mother, though back in those days, it didn’t really have a fancy name. I do understand what it’s like, and how hard it can be. You don’t know what pain feels like until your own mother forgets who you are, even though you spend every living moment looking after them.

  ‘But I also know this – your mother would be the last person on earth who would want to feel like she was stopping you from living your life. It would absolutely break her heart.’

  I remember now, from things that Frank has said, that Edie cared for her own parents until their deaths. I give myself a brief telling off for forgetting how much experience she has, and for falling into the trap of assuming I am totally unique in my suffering.

  ‘I know, Edie – you’re right. So I try not to think like that, or to see my life as not being lived. I’m just … adjusting it, that’s all. The day centre might close – it’s already down to one day a week. Auburn is staying, but she’ll probably be busy working in the pharmacy soon. And Van, well, he hasn’t said anything, but I don’t think he’ll be staying too much longer. There are only so many hours in the day, and it’s not fair to Tom to expect him to hang around, waiting for more than I can give.’

  She wags her finger at me, just to warn me that I’m about to get a telling off.

  ‘Well, maybe you ought to talk to your brother and sister about all of that before you think you know what’s going on. And as for Tom, he didn’t strike me as an idiot. He seemed very bright.’

  ‘Yes, he is. Very bright. What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, Willow, that he’s old enough to make his own decisions about what is and isn’t right for him – it’s not up to you to make them for him. He’s a grown man with a fine mind, he’s capable of weighing up the pros and cons. And as for Van and Auburn, it doesn’t even sound like you know what they’re up to – which leads me to conclude, in Miss Marple style, that you’re basing your whole future and Tom’s on the basis of absolutely bloody nothing. Excuse my French.

  ‘Now, while you give that some thought, be a dear, and fetch me a slice of cake, will you? Not the birthday cake – that’s for later, hurrah! – but some of that lemon meringue that Laura does so well? Maybe a smidgeon of cream? No, actually – make that a lot of cream! You know what they say – you’re only ninety-two once!’

  I stare at her, shell-shocked by that whole speech. Miss Marple indeed. I can’t argue with her logic, and know that it’s only stubbornness and self-pity that’s even making me want to. I wasn’t happy with the course I was taking, but I was set on it – now Edie’s come along and blown me way out to sea again.

  It’s a lot to process, this different perspective, and it effectively smacks me out of my assumptions of what is right and what is wrong. I need time to think – but as ever, I don’t have that. Maybe I should stop thinking so much, and start feeling. Maybe thinking is over-rated. And the way I’m feeling is desolate. I can’t fix some parts of my life – but perhaps I can work on others.

  I reach over the pile of bath sets and paperbacks and photo frames, and give Edie a quick hug, before getting to my feet and saying goodbye.

  I climb past Anton, and collar Lizzie, who’s passing with a tray of canapés, and tell her to go and fetch Edie the biggest slice of lemon meringue she can cut, along with a whole boat-load of cream.

  ‘Okay …’ she says, frowning, crinkling up her eyeliner as she does. ‘But what kind of boat? A kayak full of cream? A catamaran? An ocean liner?’

  ‘Think Titanic,’ I reply, grinning at her. ‘Without the icebergs and Jack and Rose.’

  I pat her arm, and dash off to the corner, where Mum and Van are finishing their dance as the song draws to a close. Auburn heads back in our direction, looking flushed and wafting her face with her hands to cool down. She slips her high heels back on, and flashes us a smile.

  ‘Wow. That Mateo has some moves – he even makes a waltz feel like foreplay,’ she says, sounding impressed. ‘I might need to sign up for some private lessons!’

  I ignore her blatant invitation to talk smut, and instead look at her and Van, my face set and serious.

  ‘What are you two planning?’ I ask, simply. They both look at me blankly, then look at each other, and I realise I need to be more specific.

  ‘Auburn – you’re staying, aren’t you? How will it work, with the pharmacy? Will you be doing long hours?’

  She lifts her hair up from the back of her neck to let the air in, and gives me a crooked smile.

  ‘That’s not the plan, no,’ she replies. ‘I mean, what would be the point? I didn’t come back here just to work, and leave you to look after Mum. I’m planning to work part-time, and I’ve been talking to Katie about her taking on some hours. She’s a nurse by training, and she’s been doing a top-up course at the college. Saul’s starting pre-school soon, so she’s looking for flexible work.

  ‘I’ll have to have set hours that people know in advance, when there’s an actual pharmacist available – you know, so I can tell them what creams to put on their warts and such like. But the rest of the time, it’ll open as a shop and for over the counter stuff. I’ll be here, sis. I’ll be able to help – if you want me to.’

  Her voice fades a little as she says this, and I know she’s still suffering from the guilt even more than I am. I clasp hold of her hand, and reply: ‘Of course I do. Thank you.’

  I turn to Van, who is downing a lager and still fiddling with his phone. I raise my eyebrows at him. ‘What about you? No bullshit, Van. If you need to go back to Tanzania, I understand. I appreciate you coming back, and I won’t hold it against you at all if you leave – I know you have a life there, and I don’t expect you to give it up. But I do need to know, so spill.’

  He gives me a mock salute, and replies: ‘Aye aye, captain! Well, I’m in. I’m staying. I’ve had to cancel flights, and make a lot of arrangements, and that’s why I’ve been a bit cagey. I needed to sort it all out first. But if you want me, I’m here – I’ll pick up some farming work or some labouring. It’s a busy time of year. I’ll try and work it so it fits in with your schedule. I mean, why would I want to leave? Isn’t it every man’s dream to be sleeping back in his childhood bed, in the same room as his little sister? I really think, if I’m staying, that you and Auburn should—’

  ‘No way!’ I say, interrupting him. ‘I’m not giving up my room for any of you. I’ve earned that room. But … that’s great. And yes, of course I want you to stay. Thank you. Right, I have to skedaddle.’

  As I leave, I hear Mum – who has politely watched our conversation like it was a tennis match, turning her head from this way to that – finally speak.

  ‘Tanzania?’ she says, sounding impressed. ‘When did you go to Tanzania, Van? What an adventure!’

  Chapter 38

  I sprint out of the ballroom, and gallop up the stairs, taking them two at a time. I run along the hallway, and fling open the door to his room.

  It’s dramatic and silly, and also completely useless – because the room is now empty. Some time between my leaving and my potentially life-changing chat with the wisest woman in Budbury, he’s disappeared.

  I stare out of the window, seeing the fountain outlined in the moonlight, the rain still slicing through the night sky in jagged sheets. I remember the first time I saw him out there, with Ric
k Grimes, and think of all the ways my life has changed since that day.

  I feel the desperation seep through me, and run all the way back down the stairs. I bump past Scrumpy Joe at the bottom, briefly apologise as I dash towards the front door, and leave him with one of those ‘huh – women!’ looks on his face that men get when we confuse them.

  Outside, the rain is thundering down, and the red carpet, no longer sheltered by dancing umbrellas, is soggy beneath my feet. I pause by the fountain, and decide to head towards the camper van. Maybe I’ll find him there, watching a TED Talk on YouTube or something, and I can turn up on his doorstep like a damp Cinderella and make everything right.

  I use the torch from my phone to light my way, and squelch along the footpath past the pond; around the ghosts of skinny-dipping past and the echoes of old laughter. It’s incredibly dark beneath the canopy of trees, and I keep getting whacked in the face by over-hanging branches, raindrops shimmering all over my hair. I drive myself on, swearing beneath my breath with every near-miss with a gnarled tree root, until I finally arrive at the clearing.

  I slip and slide towards the camper, and see that it too is dark. The tables and chairs from outside have been packed away. There are no lights on inside, and no sound that implies any kind of human or canine habitation. I shine my phone up towards the window, and see that Baby Groot has gone, little pot and all.

  This isn’t a good sign. If Baby Groot is gone, then he’s gone. If he was in there, sleeping, or thinking, or binging on fig rolls, Baby Groot would still be there, arms waving on the window ledge.

  I reach up and push the door, just in case. It’s locked, and I am swamped with misery. He’s gone, and I’ve no idea when I’ll see him again.

  I realisse that the answer to such questions might lie in the simple use of the telephonic device in my freezing hands – but that’s a no-go. Tom, being the inventor of the flange bracket and all-round wunderkind, was clever enough to wrap our phones in sandwich bags last time we were running around in the forest at night in the rain, like extras in Predator. I, being the inventor of precisely nothing apart from a stylish range of customised Doc Marten boots, didn’t even think of such a thing.

  The phone is as soaking wet as I am, and doesn’t work. Even the torch is starting to flicker now. I let out a howl of frustration, the kind that will cause anybody who hears it to stock up on silver bullets.

  I stay there for a few more moments, rain slicking down my hair and pouring over my bare skin, feeling defeated. I allow myself that – just for those few moments.

  Then I hitch up the skirt of my dress, tuck the soggy strands of hair behind my ears, and start running. I know this place like the back of my hand – or better than that, as I’ve not actually spent a lot of time getting acquainted with the back of my hand, and think that’s a very stupid saying.

  I know this place, in the way you always know the things you grew up with. Like the adverts that were on TV when you were ten, or the lyrics to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

  I spent days and weeks exploring these woods, and I know all the shortcuts, and all the footpaths, and all the secret ways. I know there are routes down to the bottom of the hill that might get me there soon enough – the routes I wanted to check out the night my mum went missing, but Tom was sensible enough to talk me out of.

  I am going to work on the assumption that he can’t have got far. I was only gone for minutes, and he definitely hadn’t left that room by the time I got to the bottom of the stairs. While I was talking to Edie, he must have come back here, grabbed Baby Groot and Rick Grimes, and locked up. Then he’d have had to make his way back to the side of the house, where he keeps the Noddy car in a garage, and find a way out through all the parked jeeps and the coach and everyone else’s car. I might even have been on my way here by the time he managed that.

  I run, as fast as I can, through the dripping branches and the night-coated trees and the mud that seems to try and suck my boots in with every step. I slap cold leaves out of my way, and leap over roots and stones like a Ninja. My dress tears as I clamber over the last stile before the main road, and my hair is so splattered over my face I can barely see. I’m probably freezing cold now – but my adrenaline doesn’t know that. My adrenaline keeps me going, as I charge through the deepest, darkest heartland of the woods.

  I am a woman on a mission, and by the time I emerge back into civilisation and onto the main road, I am pumped up so much I could probably fly if I tried. I dash into the middle of the road, my eyes adjusting to being out of the dense woodland again, and stare in the direction of Briarwood.

  If he’s already gone, I tell myself, then it’s not the end of the world. He might be lost but I can find him again. I know that’s sensible, and I know it’s right, but I just can’t feel it – I feel like this is my last chance. That if I let him go, I might never see him again, no matter what he promised. And if that happens, I know I’ll have made the biggest mistake of my entire life.

  I stand, hands on hips, panting with exertion now I’ve finally stopped. My dress is torn, I’m soaked and bedraggled, and I know I have enough dirt and grime on my face to qualify as camo on an SAS training camp.

  I stare up that road, waiting for something that might never come. I stare up that road, praying for him not to have left. I stare up that road, knowing that if he doesn’t appear, I have a long, sad walk back up to Briarwood.

  I stare, and I stare, and I stare. And I see nothing, apart from the spooky shapes of the hedgerows, and the white lines in the middle of the road, and the man in the moon, laughing at me from his lofty heights.

  I see nothing, and hear nothing, and eventually, without even making a conscious decision to, I start to walk – deflated, empty, cold, and miserable.

  I walk slowly, each stop a torturous plod in waterlogged boots now heavy with mud – and as I walk, squelching and defeated, I finally see it.

  I see light – seeping through the darkness ahead of me.

  I stop, and squint, wondering if I’ve imagined it, or if it’s a spaceship about to land, full of curious alien beings keen to whisk me away on their flying saucer.

  It’s not. It’s a car, coming around the bend in the road, long-range headlights on, heading right for me. I stand still, frozen, until I realise that I probably look terrifying and might well cause any car driving towards me to crash.

  I jump up and down and wave my arms, jiggling the flickering light of my phone up and down in a bid to attract attention. The headlights come closer. I hear the sound of the engine, and for one brief moment think that all of this might end with me, splat, squashed on the wet tarmac like a cartoon villain beneath an ACME steamroller.

  The car slows, and I’m blinded by the headlights, caught in their beam, hands over my eyes to try and shield them from the glare. The car stops, and the headlights are switched to low, and I hear the car door open.

  I still can’t see properly, between the dazzle and the rain and the blackness of the sky around me – but I know it’s him. I know it’s him because I hear Rick Grimes let out a booming woof, and the skittering of his claws as he leaps out of the back seat, and in my direction.

  The dog reaches me first, licking and snuffling and shoving his snout up my torn skirt, in the way that dogs will.

  Tom reaches me next, and does none of those things. He just stands there, looking at me, obviously confused. He’s changed back into jeans and his Goonies T-shirt, and he looks a million times better to me than when he was dollied up in a dinner suit. Because now he looks like Tom – my Tom.

  ‘What are you doing out here?’ he asks, which isn’t an unreasonable question.

  ‘Oh, you know, I was just passing,’ I say, swiping a sodden rope of hair out of my eyes.

  ‘Just passing?’ he says, as Rick disappears off to investigate the bushes. ‘Just passing, on the road, in the rain?’

  ‘No. Not really. I was looking for you. I thought … I thought you’d gone. I thought I’d missed you.’
/>   ‘You almost did,’ he says, reaching out to wipe the rain from my cheeks. ‘Edie was waiting outside Briarwood with that golfing umbrella, just as I was pulling out. She wanted to tell me in intimate detail about every single one of her birthday presents, including the hand-knitted toilet roll holder doll her great-niece made her. She did go on a bit – but I had to stay and chat; you can’t walk out on Edie, especially when it’s her birthday. You’re freezing. Come and sit in the car.’

  I laugh, and he must be fearing for my sanity as well as my core body temperature. God bless Edie May, I think, picturing her out there, on the soggy red carpet, three steps ahead of the world.

  ‘Not yet,’ I say, grabbing hold of both his hands. My fingers are trembling, but I only know that when I see them – I’ve lost all feeling in every limb by this stage. ‘Not until I tell you what I need to tell you.’

  ‘Okay,’ he replies, rubbing my fingers. ‘But do it quickly, or you’ll turn blue, like the people in Avatar. Far less sexy in real life.’

  I gaze up at him, and see that the thick fuzz of his hair is covered in rain – the sparkling droplets stay on the surface, like on a seal’s coat, or like Midgebo when he’s been in the sea. He’s so beautiful, and I know that I’m making the right decision, even if it’s not an easy one.

  ‘I love you, Tom,’ I say, simply. ‘I love you, and I don’t want you to go back to London. I know it might not be fair asking you to stay, but please – don’t go. I don’t know how all of this will work out. I know it’s all messed up. I know it will be hard. But please stay here, with me – and not as my friend. As more than that. As my … Tom. My flange bracket. My everything. I know what my life was like before you came – and now I don’t think I can live without you.’

  He ponders this, and I see the mighty cogs of his super-powered brain at work.

  ‘Technically, you could live without me,’ he says, thoughtfully. ‘You know, if you had food, water, shelter from the elements … you could live without me, Willow. And I could live without you.’