He said it as per the American spelling. Col-or. Tessa laughed.
‘That was it,’ said Tom. ‘I’d already been through an excruciating experience with the production designer who wanted to put me into this Red Adair–style red jumpsuit. Tight. I would have looked like a bull terrier coming down a ladder from the back – balls ahoy.’
Tessa was so amused by this prospect, she had to sit down on an upturned metal fire bucket to recover.
‘But aren’t you bound by some hideous legal contract?’ she asked. ‘We haven’t got to pay them money to spring you from doing the US show, have we?’
‘No, that all turned out rather well. I let the UK producers know how much the Yanks were planning to change the format and they were able to break off the whole deal as a breach of contract.’
‘Did you get Barney the Dinosaur to do that?’ asked Tessa.
A frown crossed Tom’s face at the mention of his agent.
‘He was a large part of the problem,’ said Tom. ‘He was so excited about breaking into the US “TV scene” he would happily have had me roasted on a spit in a Tudor-style inglenook live on air to stay in with what he thought was the network – although it turned out it never was the network he was dealing with. It was the tinpot production company, who wanted him to think they were big shots. The whole thing was monstrously tacky.’
‘Gosh,’ said Tessa. ‘So where does that leave you with darling Barney?’
‘I’ve dropped him,’ said Tom. ‘He was also trying to get me to sign away the rights to the Hunter Gatherer name for a line of “homewares” which were going to be manufactured – brand new – in China. “Tim Chiminey’s Hunter Gatherer Salvage Style”. Can you imagine?’
‘All too well,’ said Tessa. ‘That has been the landscape of my nightmares for some time. But are you sure that’s definitely not happening …’
‘It’s definitely not happening,’ said Tom, putting his arms around her. ‘I said no and without my signature he can’t do the deal – and your signature, as a matter of fact. We own the name jointly. So that’s not happening, but what is happening is that I’m going to spend a lot more time back in this yard, which I love, and with you, who I love even more. I’ll still go off and fix the odd Regency fire surround for a desperate oligarch, but I’m taking some time off before I do any more TV.’
‘Blimey,’ said Tessa, ‘I’m amazed. I thought you loved it so much … the attention, the fans …’
‘It did turn my head for a bit, Tessa,’ he said. ‘I can’t deny it. But we had dinners with various fifth-rank TV people while we were in LA and I realised what I could turn into. Fish face cosmetic surgery, hair weaves, aggressive dye jobs, a general air of desperation. No, thank you.’
Tessa wrapped her arms around him and squeezed tight, burying her face in his shoulder. She felt like she had the real Tom back. Not just back from the trip to Los Angeles, but from his strange sojourn in celebrity land. In that moment she realised quite how much she’d missed him.
Tom pulled away and lifted up her chin with his finger.
‘You’ve got a big black smudge of dirt on your nose,’ he said, smiling at her tenderly. ‘It’s very fetching, but what do you say, we go back to the house and clean you up?’
Tessa grinned at him and, grabbing his hand in a firm grip, headed towards the barn door.
Friday, 11 July
Cranbrook
Daisy spotted them first, her face squashed against the glass of the train door, as it pulled into Staplehurst station.
‘There’s Granny!’ she yelled out. ‘And Auntie Tessa! Look, Mum, they’re both on the platform waiting for us. Brilliant, we’ll get to go in Auntie Tessa’s stinky car. You said we were getting a taxi.’
Busy gathering up their bags, Rachel didn’t have a chance to look until the train had stopped, but sure enough, as the automatic doors slid open, there were two of the people she loved most in the world.
The girls leapt from the train like excited dogs, throwing themselves first at their grandmother – who was still walking with two sticks and had to brace herself – and then their aunt.
By the time Rachel disembarked, carrying everyone’s things, her mother was waiting to greet her. Despite the sticks, Joy managed to enfold her in her arms and Rachel buried her head in her mother’s shoulder and the familiar smell of lavender and rose geranium essential oils.
Then Tessa came over and put her arms around both of them, kissing the side of Rachel’s head, and Daisy and Ariadne squirmed into the middle grabbing hold of anyone they could.
‘Group hug! Group hug!’ Daisy was shouting.
‘I’m the ham! I’m the ham!’ shrieked Ariadne, wriggling right into the middle.
‘Can’t you be cheese?’ asked Joy. ‘You know I don’t eat meat. I don’t want ham in my sandwich.’
‘I’m the cheese! I’m the cheese!’ continued Ariadne.
‘I’m the chutney,’ said Daisy. ‘Granny, you can be the naan bread … Nan bread, do you get it? Nan bread …’
‘Very good, Daisy,’ said Joy, stepping back, so as not to be knocked over in the melee. ‘You’re a very witty girl. Your grandfather would be proud of you.’
‘I’m the pita bread, Granny,’ said Ariadne, putting her hand over her grandmother’s where it was gripping a stick, as they headed off towards the station car park.
‘Oh, well done, Ari,’ said Joy, ‘Grandpa would be very proud of you too.’
‘But that’s not even a pun,’ said Daisy. ‘Where’s the wit in that?’
Joy leaned down towards her and, pulling the stick up towards her elbow, to free her hand, pretended to twist her ear.
‘You’re a wit nit,’ she said, ‘and you’re both a couple of crumpets.’
Tessa was helping Rachel carry the bags.
‘Thanks for coming to meet us, Tessie,’ said Rachel.
‘We’ve been so excited about seeing you all,’ said Tessa, ‘we couldn’t stand waiting at the house any longer. It’s been ages since we’ve heard from you …’
‘Nearly three weeks,’ said Rachel. ‘Very long by our normal standards. I’m really sorry, Tessa. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you and Mum like that, especially with her still getting over that fall. It was Natasha I was angry with, but I couldn’t help it, and I was a little bit angry with you, but that was just me bundling all my worries together.’
‘I’m so sorry about that bonus,’ said Tessa. ‘I felt awful when I realised I’d stopped you getting it.’
‘It’s OK,’ said Rachel. ‘You’d already lent me £3000 – which I am going to pay you back, by the way – so I had no right to be cross with you about money. It was just with it coming right after the upset with Natasha, I was raw.’
‘Are you still angry with her?’ asked Tessa, stopping to adjust Daisy’s and Ariadne’s surprisingly heavy backpacks and because she wanted to hear Rachel’s answer before they caught up with the others, who were making rather slow progress.
‘No,’ said Rachel, ‘not like I was. I’m still bewildered why she did it, but I’m not angry any more, because I’ve just learned something very important the hard way.’
‘What’s that?’ asked Tessa.
‘Well,’ said Rachel, putting her bags down too, ‘I’ve discovered that if you push your family away out of anger, you’re left in a very lonely isolated place to get over whatever made you feel hurt in the first place. Then that makes you feel abandoned as well as hurt, so then you start to feel bitter and go looking for reasons not to forgive them to justify your feelings … and on it goes. A toxic downward spiral. It’s made me understand how those terrible family feuds you hear about can happen.’
‘Well, you’re here now,’ said Tessa, putting her arm round her younger sister and pulling her close. ‘Definitely no feuds in this family. Now let’s get us all back to the house for dinner.’
‘And wine,’ said Rachel.
‘Definitely wine,’ said Tessa, ‘every kind of wine.’
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Joy looked around the dinner table and sent up a prayer of thanks to have her beautiful family – very nearly all of them – reunited. Tom and Tessa were sitting so close together she was practically on his knee, their heads nearly touching, like a pair of lovebirds.
Joy believed head-to-head contact was as big a signifier of closeness between humans as it was in the animal kingdom and she could read the signals between them like a billboard. Nothing to worry about there any more.
Especially now Tom had seen through the illusory attraction of fame. He was a good man, she’d always known that and she was so glad Tessa hadn’t gone any further down that dangerous path with Simon. Not that he wasn’t a good man too, in his own way. Joy sincerely believed he was, just not for Tessa.
Turning her attention to Rachel, there was more to be concerned about. She was so thin it was quite alarming and had dark circles under her eyes, which Joy was certain indicated anxieties beyond the upset of falling out with her immediate family.
Even more worryingly, she’d lost her spark, that feisty appetite for life which always reminded Joy so much of her first husband. Although she was clearly happy and relieved to be reunited with her and Tessa, Rachel still looked quite defeated. Joy would have to find out what was going on there. And she hoped once she had, she might also be able to guide her to forgive Natasha. Then the circle would finally be complete again.
Or as near as it could be.
Saturday, 12 July
Cranbrook
Joy got her chance to talk to Rachel after lunch on Saturday. It was another lovely day and they’d eaten in the garden. After taking the last of the plates in to the kitchen, Rachel came back to Joy, still sitting at the table, so she wouldn’t be left alone. Always going that little bit further than anyone else.
‘Are you all right, Mum?’ she asked, looking slightly perkier than when she’d arrived, after eighteen hours back with her extended family, but still drawn.
‘Yes, darling,’ said Joy, ‘but perhaps you can help me take my walk. I’m supposed to walk for five minutes at least three times a day, but I need to have someone with me in case I fall again.’
‘I’d love to,’ said Rachel, enjoying the knowledge that she didn’t have to make sure the girls would be looked after while she did it. In that house, there was always somebody around. ‘Where shall we go?’
‘Let’s take a turn around the orchard,’ said Joy. ‘I’d like to see how the fruit is coming on this year.’
‘OK,’ said Rachel, picking her mum’s sticks up from the ground and helping her to her feet.
Joy got her arms into the plastic cuffs and they set off slowly up the path mown through the meadow. Rachel looked around at the wild flowers with butterflies and bees flitting about among them and took a deep breath of the clean, chlorophyll-filtered air.
‘I always forget how lovely it is here in summer,’ she said. ‘When you live in London and there are trees along the streets and Hyde Park and bits of grass in roundabouts and all that, you kid yourself you’re still in touch with nature, but when you come down here and you’re really in it, it makes you understand the difference. The bits of green in a city are like tropical fish in a tiny tank. This is the wide open ocean.’
Joy smiled, leaving her to drink it in. She could almost see the knots in her neck loosening. Her darling girl, she was wound like a tight spring.
‘Are you OK, Mum?’ asked Rachel, turning to look at her mother, who was taking a while to make it up the slight incline towards the orchard. ‘Not too much for you?’
‘As long as I take it slow and steady, I think mixed terrain is the best exercise for my hip, keeps it moving in all directions.’
‘You should know, yoga guru,’ said Rachel, smiling at her with something slightly more like her usual vivid life force, but the strain still clear across her face. ‘Let me know when you’ve had enough.’
They walked on into the thicket of fruit trees, the sunshine dappled by the leaves, birds singing. Rachel paused and put her arms round a gnarled old apple tree, pressing her face against its trunk.
Joy laughed.
‘Are you hugging that tree, Rachel Lambton?’ she asked her.
‘Yes,’ said Rachel. ‘I’m giving it a go. Come on, tree, give me your healing energy. Share your wisdom with me, oh mighty tree-ee. Am I doing it right, Mum?’
Joy tapped her on the bottom with one of her sticks.
‘Cheeky,’ she said, ‘and you know – there is no right or wrong way, just however feels right for you.’
‘It feels rather scratchy, if you really want to know,’ said Rachel, turning her head so her other cheek was on the bark.
‘Well, if you stop talking and just be for a few moments, you might get something out of it, letting go of intention and expectation …’
‘I’m hugging a tree,’ said Rachel, ‘and I’m supposed to not think about why I’m doing it?’
Joy balanced her sticks against the neighbouring tree, a plum, then rested her body against it, wrapping her arms around the trunk, breathing out audibly through her nose.
‘Ooooohhhhmmmm,’ said Rachel.
‘Stop it, Rachel,’ said her mother, ‘just quieten your inner and outer voices, especially the outer one, in your case, breathe and stop thinking. Just be. Try it for five breaths.’
After an initial urge to start giggling, or blow a raspberry, anything not to do what her mum advised, she finally surrendered to it.
When she opened her eyes again, she had no idea how long she’d been standing there. Joy was watching her, leaning back against her own tree. She smiled at Rachel.
‘How do you feel?’ she asked.
Rachel blinked.
‘I feel rather good actually,’ she said. ‘Did I just go to sleep?’
‘Not sleep,’ said Joy, ‘you went into a deep meditative state.’
‘Blimey,’ said Rachel, stepping away from the tree and rubbing her face. It felt lumpy where it had been pressed against the bark. ‘I didn’t think I could meditate. I always start thinking about not thinking and get so brain boggled I give up. Thanks, tree.’
She patted its trunk and then leaned forward and gave it a kiss.
‘I’ll never forget you,’ she said. ‘How was it for you?’
Joy shook her head, but she was smiling.
‘Sorry, Mum. I hijacked your walk, do you want to go back now, or on a bit further?’
‘Let’s go on,’ said Joy. ‘I’m ready for a bit more exercise after my rest.’
They resumed their stroll, commenting on the fruit beginning to swell on the trees, until they came to the clearing with the fringed swing seat in it.
‘Wow,’ said Rachel, ‘I haven’t seen this one before. It’s fab.’
‘Tessa had it put out a few weeks ago. She said the shoot you did down here with the garden furniture gave her the idea.’
‘Is it safe to sit on?’ asked Rachel, giving the seat a gentle push. ‘Most of her stuff is lethal.’
‘I think it’s OK, but perhaps you could try it first?’ said Joy.
‘Sure,’ said Rachel, ‘then we can both have broken hips.’
She sat down gingerly and moved the seat back and forth a couple of times. It didn’t come crashing down.
‘Seems good to me, let me help you.’
Rachel stood up again and braced the seat with her knee to keep it still, while helping her mother down on to it, then settled herself next to her. They sat in silence for a while, Rachel gently swinging the seat back and forth with one foot, just enjoying the peace among the trees.
Then Joy turned to look at Rachel.
‘So tell me what’s going on with you, Rachel,’ she said, quietly.
Rachel turned her head quickly to look at her. She knew what a question like that from her mother really meant. Not just a general ‘How are things with you?’ chit chat, but ‘What’s going on that you’re trying to hide?’ She immediately turned her head away again. Was it not possible to keep
anything private in her family?
‘Come on, darling,’ said Joy, putting her hand gently on Rachel’s arm. ‘I know something’s very wrong and you’ll feel so much better if you tell someone about it and nobody could care more than I do. You know I won’t judge you, I just want to be able to support you. I’ve never seen you look so wrung out.’
‘Is it that obvious?’ said Rachel, turning to look at her mother.
‘Yes,’ said Joy, reaching out and tracing the black shadows under Rachel’s eyes with her forefinger, then the two little lines that had appeared between her eyebrows over the past few months.
Rachel took a deep breath.
‘I’m in debt,’ she said. There, it was out. She’d told somebody.
‘How badly in debt?’ asked Joy.
‘Very badly,’ said Rachel. ‘My salary barely pays off my overdraft each month and I can’t even make the minimum payments for what I owe on credit cards – which adds up to £20,000 already and it keeps going up because I’m being charged late-payment fees and then I have to pay more and more interest on all of it, so it’s getting worse at a constantly accelerating rate. It’s like being on some kind of monstrous theme-park ride.’
Joy sat and took it in. Debt. A terrifying idea. No wonder Rachel looked so hunted.
‘Can you pay your mortgage?’ she asked.
Rachel shook her head.
‘I’m in arrears with that as well,’ she said. ‘In the past couple of months, it’s all I’ve been able to do to feed the girls.’
‘Is that why you’re so thin?’ asked Joy.
She knew about that one. She’d been there herself. Not from debt, just from having hardly any income. Going without dinner herself, so the children could eat. Being a widowed single mum in the mid-1970s had been no joke.
Rachel nodded.
‘Oh, darling,’ said Joy, pulling Rachel towards her.
Rachel leaned stiffly against her mother. She thought telling someone would make her cry, but she just felt numb with the shame.
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