A Gift from the Comfort Food Café

by Debbie Johnson

  I’m checking through our files, keeping myself busy, when I hear an alert from my phone. I get it out of my pocket, and check to see what it is.

  It’s a notification from Facebook. Jason has accepted my friend request, and Facebook wonders if I’d like to send him a message or wave to him.

  What I’d actually like to do is rewind the last hour, and not contact him at all. But I somehow suspect that’s beyond Facebook’s power.

  Chapter 22

  I’m grateful to be in work for the rest of the morning, and equally grateful to have to go to college in the afternoon. I’ve passed three of the four modules I’m study-ing already, and only have one more to go. Having Mum around has, at least, taken off a lot of the pressure around childcare.

  Before, it was a workable but ad hoc arrangement with my various friends – and with Laura now very much in the family way, and Lynnie taking a downward swing, I’m glad I don’t have to impose.

  I’m also glad I’ve had something to occupy my mind, as Jason and I have been exchanging messages all day. There’s something about the whole messaging thing that makes it feel more personal than an email – like we’re talking to each other in real time.

  He’s now seen the few photos I have of Saul on my account, and seems interested in all of them – and in our life here. I suppose that’s kind of what I wanted, but it also feels vaguely unsettling. Like I’ve opened a can of worms that’s now going to crawl all over me; that I’ll still be shaking off my skin even when they’re gone.

  It also seems that Jason was on the verge of contacting me anyway – partly to ask what Saul might want for Christmas, and partly to share some news.

  His wife, Jo, is pregnant. Again, this weirds me out – not because I still have feelings for Jason, but because it means that Saul will be getting a little brother or sister in about six months’ time. Logically, I knew that my life would always be connected to Jason’s through our son – but this news makes it all the more real. More complicated. A whole lot more difficult to ever run away from. I feel strangely trapped by it all, and can’t quite understand why.

  The absolute last thing I feel like doing is going to the café for a big group dinner. I love my pals, I really do, and I’ve taken big strides in getting more involved with village life. But I now realise that when I feel conflicted, or worried, my instinct is still to hide away from the world and sort it out myself. To shut all the potential stress factors down and retreat to my bunker.

  It’s a pattern I’m now familiar with, but only really identified when I briefly attended a support group for single mums. We had a group counselling session where we were all asked to mark important turning points in our ‘journeys’.

  I left the support group after two weeks – to be honest, I’m not very communal, and I also felt like a bit of a fraud. I definitely hadn’t suffered enough in comparison to some of the other women there, and was worried I might start making things up just to fit in.

  But I do always remember that session. I remember sitting in a circle on a hard plastic chair, Saul in the crèche off to one side, probably trying to eat Duplo, my eyes closed and hands wrapped around a plastic cup of hot coffee. I think that was half the attraction, the hot coffee.

  I sat there, eyes closed, and I saw that pattern. Saw it, and took it home with me to examine later. That night, when my precious baby boy/demon spawn was finally asleep, I sat sprawled across the sofa, watching repeats of Through The Keyhole and remembering things I’d thought dead and buried. Reliving moments so painful I’d hidden them deep under seventeen layers of denial.

  I’m feeling the same now, and the sensation of being under attack reminds me of when I was a kid, and things were getting heated downstairs in the Land of the Lunatics. The way I’d lock my bedroom door and listen to music, or walk the streets for hours on end just to escape from the insanity and the noise and the anger.

  I kind of want to do that now – or at least to not have to be in company I’m not fit to be in. I know how this will go: I feel pressurised, so I’ll retreat. It’ll be like the time earlier in the year when Edie was having her ninety-second birthday at Briarwood. I’d been to all the dancing lessons, I’d helped plan the event, but when it came down to it, I couldn’t face it – there were too many people, and too much attention.

  I’d wussed out and stayed at home with Saul instead.

  On the bus ride home today, I’d briefly toyed with the idea of coming up with some excuse to wuss out again, but the text messages from pretty much everyone I know reminding me to be there by 7.30 were making it patently clear that that wasn’t an option.

  So, my brain a simmering pot of stress stew, I find myself walking to the café on my own, through village streets that feel deserted – probably because everyone is at the café.

  Mum has headed over early with Saul, keen to talk to Cherie about her job and the flat, and I’d had time to get ready on my own. It should have felt like a luxury – but it actually felt like torture. My make-up was applied half-heartedly, and I wasn’t even sure what my hair was supposed to be doing.

  In an empty house, I had too much time to think, too much time to worry, too much time to wonder about how my life would look if Saul wasn’t in it. If, for example, he was spending time away in Scotland – with his dad and his new baby brother or sister.

  The whole thing feels like a case of ‘be careful what you wish for’ to me. Hours ago, a lifetime ago, this morning in the pharmacy, I’d been thinking that it would be a good idea for Saul to get to know his dad better. To not grow up feeling unwanted or rejected in any way. To not only rely on me for love and nurturing and approval.

  Now it looks as though that might be happening, I’m frankly terrified. I know that doesn’t say anything good about me, but it’s how I feel. I can’t change the situation – it is what it is – all I can do is try to adapt. To stay calm, and get through it. If life crises have taught me anything, it’s that with time, things won’t always feel as bad as they do in the heat of the moment.

  I tell myself this over and over again as I walk, far too slowly, towards the café. It’s dark, and chillingly cold, and snow has been forecast overnight. I’m wrapped up warm but, without a balaclava, still have icy cheeks that feel as though Jack Frost has rubbed his bony fingers all over my skin.

  By the time I get to the café, lit up with its fairy lights, I’ve decided that I’ll only stay for an hour. I can fake it for an hour – then I’ll come up with some reason, like Saul being tired or Tinkerbell needing a foot massage, so I can make my excuses and leave.

  I trudge my way reluctantly up the path and into the garden, where the giant inflatable Father Christmas is wobbling around, half in shadow from the illumination spilling from the steamed-up café windows.

  I take a deep breath, tell myself I can hide in a corner and leave as soon as possible, and push open the door.

  I’m immediately struck by two things. One is the heat – the place is warm and crowded and suddenly makes all my coats and scarves and gloves feel unnecessary. The other is the noise.

  As soon as I step through the door, the whole place erupts into a chorus of ‘For She’s a Jolly Good Fellow’, loud and discordant and threaded through with the one or two voices that are actually hitting the right notes.

  I freeze, rooted to the spot, and actually look behind me – checking to see who it is they’re singing to.

  As there’s nobody else there, and there’s also a huge banner strung up along the serving counter that says ‘Well done Katie!’, I come to the inescapable conclusion that they’re actually singing to me.

  I don’t know how I must look to the assembled masses standing in front of me, but I’m guessing that it might involve the words ‘deer’ and ‘headlights’.

  Saul dashes forward and hugs my legs. He’s getting bigger now, taking after his dad in height rather than me, and I kneel down to hug him back. And, you know, to hide the look of sheer horror on my face.

  These p
eople, these wonderful people, have thrown me a party to congratulate me for doing something that wasn’t even a big deal. And in return, all I feel is a driving need to run screaming back down the hill, through the village, and into my own little house. Except my own little house doesn’t even feel that safe any more – it has weird curtains, and my mum’s stuff all over it, and people have started to visit me. I’ve had Matt in the doorway and Van on the sofa and in my shower, and it all feels too big – too invasive.

  I school my face into something that hopefully doesn’t reflect this – because I know I’m being crazy – and stand up straight.

  Everyone is there – apart from Edie, of course. Everyone is looking at me, and grinning, and cheering. There’s a trestle table set up and groaning with food and drink, and the whole place is draped with little fairy lights in the shape of Christmas presents.

  If I was here in the background, celebrating somebody else’s heroism, I’d be thinking how pretty and lovely it all is. Instead, I’m still wondering how quickly I can escape.

  Becca steps forward and envelops me in a huge hug.

  ‘Thank you,’ she whispers into my ear. ‘The doctors are all amazed at her. They keep bringing students in to meet her – I think they’re considering writing some kind of paper on the Edie May miracle! Nobody thought she was going to survive, but she is. I know she is. But she wouldn’t have done if it wasn’t for you.’

  ‘And Tinkerbell,’ I add, overwhelmed.

  ‘Yeah. Tinkerbell too. Cherie has a whole plate of salmon for him as well.’

  I nod, and smile a stupid smile, and keep the stupid smile on my face as everyone troops over to thank me and hug me and pat me on the back. Laura’s there, looking tired but happy; Zoe and Cal; Sam and Little Edie; Willow and Tom and Auburn and Van and Lynnie.

  Lynnie’s looking confused but not distressed, which is a blessing, and Van gives me an extra tight squeeze when he reaches me.

  ‘You can do it,’ he murmurs into my ear. ‘Just keep on smiling!’

  That does at least make me laugh – he’s obviously seen right through my less-than-brave face. I just hope all the others haven’t.

  Finally, after a large round of thanks from Edie’s family, Cherie is by my side. She’s wearing a kaftan – an actual kaftan – decorated with tiny pom-poms, like something she picked up from a little boutique in an Aztec village.

  ‘We made you these,’ she says, ‘me and Saul. Just for you.’

  First, she shows me a big cardboard love heart, decorated in pink glitter, with the words ‘Our hero!’ written on them in neon-coloured marker pen. The heart is attached to some stripey blue and white fabric used as a necklace. I think it might possibly have been a tea-towel in a previous life. She drapes it around my neck like a medal, and flips my hair out at the back.

  Next she produces a kind of cape, obviously made from an old tablecloth, also decorated in glitter. It shimmers under the fairy lights as she wafts it around, shining specks of glitter flying off and into a sparkling cloud around our heads.

  There’s a makeshift clasp at the corners made out of glued-on press-studs, and she fastens it around my neck.

  ‘There,’ she says, smiling at her handiwork, ‘your very own superhero cape. Give us a twirl!’

  I blink rapidly and do as she says – it’s the path of least resistance, and I’m hoping that once I’ve endured this last suffocating act of kindness, I can fade into the background.

  Everyone cheers and claps as I twirl, and then, thankfully, attention starts to move away from me. Cherie calls out for music, and I see Matt, who always seems to end up manning sound systems at parties, switch it on. I think it’s his way of hiding – the anonymity of being the guy in charge of the buttons.

  Bizarrely, the first song on is Beyoncé’s ‘Single Ladies’, and everyone immediately starts busting out some dance moves and laughing. I feel the beat, and wish I could join in – I love dancing, and I’m good at it, but right now I just can’t. I wish I was the kind of person who could just twirl their superhero cape and throw herself into the party, but I’m not. I’m too much of a coward.

  I see that Saul is doing that thing that kids like doing, where he’s got his feet on Cal’s feet, and Cal is dancing him around the room. I see Laura sit down with a sigh of relief, and Matt bring over a glass of water and a paper plate laden with food. I see the teenagers, dancing in their own little circle, mock-twerking and pulling faces as they look at the old people gyrating. I see Willow and Tom cutting it up, and Auburn to one side, sitting with Lynnie. I see my mum, and she catches my eye across the room, giving me a huge grin and making a ‘thumbs up’ sign.

  Everyone is happy. Everyone is relieved. Everyone is grateful that Edie has lived to fight another day.

  I, on the other hand, am shrivelling up inside, and hating myself for it. I slink away to the ladies, smiling and chatting to people as I move through the room, feeling more and more brittle with every conversation.

  I finally make it, leaning back against the door once I’ve locked it, breathing a sigh of relief. I just need a moment, I tell myself. A moment to regroup. To calm down. To shake off the feeling that I’m some kind of imposter – that I shouldn’t be here, amongst all these people, on the receiving end of their love and support and thanks. That if they really knew me, they wouldn’t like me at all.

  Even as these thoughts flitter through my mind, I realise how silly they sound. Why shouldn’t they like me? What have I ever done that’s so bad? I shoplifted a mascara once, when I was fourteen. Technically, that’s about the worst of my sins.

  But this runs deeper than that, I know. It started young, feeling like I was a spare part in my parents’ drama. It developed into my teenaged years, where I always felt I had to keep people at arm’s length, that I needed distance from people who might hurt me.

  Now, I’m here, with a child and with friends and with a life. And yet I still feel like I don’t quite belong. Like I can’t quite connect with them in a genuine way. I’m still playing a part – and it’s not the one of a superhero.

  I splash my face with cold water, and swish my hair around to get rid of some of the glitter, and stare at myself in the mirror.

  ‘Don’t freak out – just don’t,’ I tell myself out loud. It’s been a big couple of days. Edie being ill. Everything that’s going on with Dad. Van sneaking further and further into our lives. And, with ultimate bad timing, facing up to the fact that I need to sort myself out when it comes to Jason.

  It feels like things are changing – and I don’t want them to. I’ve only just steadied myself with the basics of this community, my place in the world. And now I feel like I’m being fast-tracked on to an advanced level I’m not quite prepared for. Like if I’d gone into work as a nurse and someone expected me to perform brain surgery.

  I’m taking some deep breaths – the kind Lynnie has taught me to do when I’m feeling stressed – and turn the taps off.

  I’m preparing to leave when there’s a knock on the door. I assume I’ve been a toilet hog for too long, and someone – probably Laura – is desperate for a pee.

  ‘Coming!’ I shout, aiming to sound perky and bright and happy. In other words, the exact opposite of what I actually feel.

  I open the door, fake smile plastered onto my face along with the stray glitter, and see Van standing outside, leaning against the wall. He looks at me and grins.

  ‘Nice look,’ he says, pointing at the glitter. ‘I’m here to rescue you.’

  ‘What do you mean, rescue me? What makes you think I need rescuing from anything?’ I reply, my voice rising about seven million octaves by the end of the sentence.

  ‘The look on your face when you walked through the door. The fake smile you’re currently using. The fact that your voice sounds like Minnie Mouse on helium. And the fact that I know you, Katie, and know that this isn’t your idea of a good time. Come on – let’s sneak through the kitchens and out the back door. Saul’s fine, and if we’re qu
ick nobody will notice we’re gone. I promise I’ll have you back by midnight so you don’t turn into a pumpkin.’

  I look beyond him, to the packed café, where The Mavericks are helping everyone just dance the night away. Saul is now on Cal’s shoulders, tangling up some of the dangling lametta in his fingers, and my mum is doing her usual Eighties party dance with Frank. The idea of plunging back into it all makes my stomach clench into knots.

  I look back at Van, who has somehow figured all of this out, and nod.

  ‘Okay,’ I say quietly. ‘I’ll let you rescue me.’

  Chapter 23

  We make our way through the kitchens, for some reason tiptoeing as we do – I don’t know why, it’s not like anyone would be able to hear our footsteps over the music.

  Van pauses at a cupboard near the back, where Cherie keeps a stock of plaid fleece blankets for customers to use when they’re sitting outside in winter, and grabs a couple before we leave.

  We head off down the path, and I find myself smiling at the thought of anyone noticing us – two dark figures, doing a runner like a pair of fugitives. My superhero cape is fluttering behind me in the breeze, and I kind of wish I was also wearing tights and red pants just to make it even more ridiculous.

  Once we’re down by the bay, I feel a physical sense of relief wash over me. It’s as though gaining even this amount of distance from the party has allowed my adrenaline levels to calm down to something approaching normal.

  We walk out onto the beach, which is completely deserted. I can still hear the beat of the music from the café, and when I look up I can see its bright lights and the dancing figures inside, but it’s all small enough to feel less intimidating.

  Van was right, I think, sucking in some cold night air – I did need rescuing. And maybe, once the shock and surprise of the ambush party has worn off, I’ll be able to simply go back in and enjoy myself, like a normal human being.