Cold Enough to Freeze Cows

by Lorraine Jenkin

  Over the months, as her domain became more and more removed from her outer persona, so she felt less comfortable about people coming by. It was a form of embarrassment as they would bound to be amazed by the way that she wanted to live. She knew that people expected that she lived in tasteless disarray. She was so very unlike her mother in personality that everyone therefore assumed that she had to be her opposite. People joked that it must be annoying for her to always have her toilet seat up, even though she lived alone. She was sure that they expected her to be a parody of the archetypal Welsh bloke because that’s how she dressed for work: sitting in her pants drinking a can of Special Brew and watching re-runs of Top Gear with plates of last night’s curry still lying on the floor.

  It made her nervous to think how amazed her close friends and family would find it, but she knew that everyone would be surprised if they turned up to find her luxuriating in a floor-length dressing gown listening to Shirley Bassey.

  It was her intention to “come out” of her closet over time, but first she wanted to enjoy practicing her new expression in a place that was safe from people saying, “Eh? What d’ya want to wear that for?” It had been quite telling that she had exchanged Christmas presents with her parents after a rather festivity-free Christmas dinner and none of the gifts that she had received had made her smile anything other than a fake thank you. Did her mum really think that she would actually want a pack of navy blue T-shirts or a glass Pyrex flan dish? There were lots of things that a twenty-six-year-old woman who had just moved into her new home might love and none of them involved navy blue or Pyrex.

  She sat on a satin floor cushion in front of the sideboard and slid open the door, humming along to ‘Respect!’ What would it be tonight? What would transport her into her own special world, one where her mother didn’t stand and purse her lips and watch what she was doing, or her father didn’t keep his head down for an easy life. Gone With the Wind? No, Casablanca!

  She slid out the case and crawled over the deep-pile rug to the television in the corner. After she had set the film to start, she popped back to the kitchen to make herself a cup of tea, turned off Aretha and returned to the sofa draped in a soft throw. She massaged body lotion into her skin as the opening credits rolled. By the time Bergman had spotted Bogart, Menna was sitting in a French café in occupied France, drinking an espresso and drawing on an elegant cigarette holder.

  CHAPTER 6

  Natur y cyw yn y cawl – the nature of the chick in the broth (someone who has inherited the family traits)

  Louisa was sitting on her bed wanting desperately to be angry with someone else, but finding that her thoughts kept coming back to herself. She had changed into her pyjamas and slung her uniform on the floor: not exactly a big statement of her feelings, Esther would pick them up the next morning with only the smallest of grumbles.

  She looked sideways into the winged mirror that sat on her dressing table, alongside her jewellery box with the revolving ballet dancer on it and saw her profile – plump, miserable and dressed for bed at eight p.m. She turned away, knowing that it needed more than a suck in of her stomach and a throwing back of her shoulders to make her feel better.

  She’d parked her car a little further away from the office than usual today. Her regular space on the side street fifty yards from the bank was being dug up – just in time for the after-Christmas sales – and it had annoyed her as she’d had to drive around looking for somewhere else. Consequently, at the end of the day she had had to walk down the high street, past all the shopkeepers as they swept up after a day of people bargain hunting with wet feet. And there they were. In the window of Tan-y-Bryn’s only trendy wine bar: Rosie, Rachel and a group of their greatest friends.

  They had all been sitting in a curved sofa around a large table filled with empty glasses. They were laughing and beautiful and trendy and, and beautiful and happy, and beautiful. And she was none of those. It had crashed her down to earth, as before that (save for the parking fiasco) it had been a reasonable day: Doreen had brought in a homemade sponge, the young bloke from the Spar had been in for change and had joked with her and she’d managed to read part of the newspaper when it had been quiet in the morning. As Louisa Harrison’s days went, that was pretty good.

  But then she’d seen them. And realised that actually her day had been shit. Boring, pointless, middle-aged and shit. Why did none of her mates pop in to ask if she fancied a cocktail after work? Because she didn’t have any. Why couldn’t she look good curled up on a wine bar sofa chatting to a mate? Because her knee would have seized up from lack of suppleness, stiffness brought on by too little exercise. Why wasn’t her hair looking sexy piled up on her head, fixed with a twirl of tinsel and with tendrils hanging around her face? Because she had a bob that was cut by her mother’s hairdresser.

  On her desk the Internet finally jumped into being, and although she really didn’t feel like it, Louisa sat down and typed in the address for her blog. Then she couldn’t help herself and typed in the URL for Rachel’s blog – hoping to find an explanation of why she had been sitting with her great friends in the bar. Maybe they had been working? Maybe it was a wake of an old aunty – although, if it was, it needn’t have looked so much fun.

  It was actually worse than Louisa could have hoped for:

  Hi, I can’t write for long, but I wanted to just do this before I went out! One of the crowd called today and left a message saying that he felt that we should all go out, ‘Just Because!’ I agree: Just Because is a perfect excuse! Therefore, we’ll try for our usual table straight from work – I wonder how many of us will come and whether they’ll think Just Because is a good enough reason as well?

  Must dash! Bye, Rachel x

  Just because? One of the crowd? Our usual table?

  She’d never had a usual table – apart from perhaps the kitchen table – and she’d certainly never been part of any crowd. All her life she’d watched the wider world through a double-glazed window. As a child, she’d seen children walking up their path and then the doorbell would ring. Her father would answer it and she would hear him talking to the child and the door would close. She would watch from her place on the sofa with a blanket over her knees as the child skipped back down the path and returned to the others.

  Her dad would always dismiss it by saying that he and she were about to do something interesting anyway; they would read a story or start a game and she would feel that perhaps she was better off not going out to play. But later, when the game had stopped and her father had returned to his newspaper and she was plonked back on the sofa watching Blue Peter, she would see a gang of children racing up the estate on their bikes or huddled in a group around someone’s new toy and she would feel a pang of regret. That stab of jealousy was exactly the same feeling she had experienced earlier that afternoon.

  Suddenly, it was all too much and with resentment and frustration washing over her, Louisa burst into tears just as there was a gentle knock at the door and her dad’s curly head poked in.

  David had just popped up to make a little suggestion to his daughter to try and entice her from her room down to the sofa to sit by him. She was his little companion, his partner in crime – far more fun to sit next to than his pious wife, who tended to tut and roll her eyes at his foibles. She would never throw caution to the wind and tuck into a tin of Quality Street in the same naughty, impish way that Louisa did; Esther would comment on his cholesterol level and make him feel a greedy slob. But tins of Quality Street weren’t about sustenance and vitamin intake; they were about treating oneself and one’s loved ones over the Christmas period.

  He was just about to smile at her and make his suggestion when he saw his daughter’s despair. “My love, my love, whatever is the matter?” he said as he lurched towards her. He cradled her sobbing head to his chest and felt the tears rise up in his own eyes. “What’s the matter, my baby, what is it? You can tell me.”

  “I can’t,” she blubbed.

  “Yes,
you can,” he soothed. “Is it work?” She shook her head. “Are you ill?” He wracked his brains; it was so long since Louisa had cried like this. “Have you fallen out with your friends? A boyfriend?” Like many doting parents, David assumed that his beautiful daughter had an active social and love life, despite there being no visible evidence of either; their door had never been knocked by a stranger asking whether Louisa was in.

  The sobs changed and her sticky face peered up to his – ah, this was probably the root; Louisa had always been an open child and would always answer questions as long as they were the right ones.

  “Friends?” she blubbed. “What friends? And boyfriend! That’s a laugh.” She buried her head again and her sobs went a little quieter.

  David felt a barb go through his soul. All he’d ever really wanted was for his family to be happy – Esther and Louisa – he would do anything to make them happier, always had done. But, as he watched Louisa sobbing, his mind couldn’t help but drift back to times when perhaps he hadn’t done quite everything in his gift to make his family happy – or at least not unless he was happy first.

  When he and Esther had got married, he’d been proud of her energy and her willingness to help out. Unfortunately for him, her abilities were soon recognised by others and she became first invited, and then completely sucked in by the rounds of good causes that needed people to actually do something, rather than just cluck about doing something. So she baked cakes for raffles, delivered shopping to sick people and basically had one hundred reasons why she simply couldn’t spend any time seeing to her husband and his needs.

  When Louisa had come along, Esther had started working part-time and therefore had even more opportunity – in the eyes of others – to do a little more for her community. It was fine, they said, take the little one along too; the older folks love to see babies!

  It wasn’t that David was a complete monster, it was just that, well, he had needs and he felt that because he worked as hard as his father had before him, it would have been nice for him to have had a newspaper on the arm of his chair when he came home from work, or a cup of tea proffered. Instead, he usually found a note on the kitchen table: Gone to see to Mrs Johnson. Back at 6.30, Soup in fridge and then his wife would return at 7.30, muttering that Mrs J certainly liked to talk.

  Esther had worked part-time so that she had more time to spend with her family – doing family things – surely, not so that she could spend more time dressing peoples’ ulcers or feeding mangy cats. It got so that Louisa didn’t want to go and play jigsaws whilst her mother spring-cleaned houses the occupants of which were in hospital. David sheepishly recognised that he’d become a bit of a martyr and instead of letting his daughter play outside with her mates, he’d played with her himself.

  He would leave games of Cluedo out or pots of paint on the kitchen table. He would take books off Louisa’s bookshelf and put them in a pile on the arm of the sofa. He could see that he was making Esther feel guilty, but she obviously felt even more moved by the fact that there was an old guy living in squalor as his marbles slowly rolled away.

  So it had continued. He would take Louisa swimming when Esther called bingo numbers at the old folks Saturday get-togethers. He would take her down the park whilst Esther ran the over 60s yoga club. Although he enjoyed his time with Louisa, on the whole, it was actually done with the single aim of having a dig at his wife. To make her feel as if she was missing out – which she was – and to make her feel bad – which she did.

  Then on that day when Louisa said she wanted to run wild like Laura Ingalls, a light had gone on in David’s brain – just move. Move away from all the needy folks and the well-intentioned people who organised his wife’s life and thought that a phone call to her had meant that they had done their bit. If she lived in the middle of bloody nowhere, she couldn’t keep popping out to feed someone’s cat. Even she couldn’t justify driving seven miles in each direction to mop the piss off some guy’s floor. Someone else would have to do it – or the guy would perhaps have to learn not to piss on his floor. Can’t feed your cat? Don’t have a bloody cat.

  David’s trump card was to pretend it was for Louisa’s benefit when it had actually been wholly for his.

  Looking at Louisa, he realised that he was now being punished for his selfishness in the worst possible way. Being chuffed off that his wife was leading a working party to scrub graffiti from a bus shelter when she could have been listening to his tale about John Talbot from despatch, and brewing him a cuppa, had meant that he’d insisted on watching Blue Peter with his daughter rather than letting her go and play Icky Dicky outside with some mates.

  The upshot was that the local children had got out the habit of calling for Louisa Harrison; her dad was always putting them off.

  Now, looking down at her red eyes and her runny nose, he felt like he could cry himself.

  “Come on, Louisa, you have lots of friends,” he said as lightly as he could, but he really needed to hear a positive answer.

  “Like who? Uncle Bob? Well, he’s dead now, so name another one? Yours and Mum’s friends at the golf club? Doreen at work?”

  “Yes, why not?” said David, trying to think of other names. “What about Alex?”

  “I suppose she chats if I see her in the street, but she never comes round anymore.” David thought back to the last time Alex’s ginger head had been in their home – probably the time that she and Louisa had fallen out and Alex had trapped Louisa’s fingers under the piano lid and Louisa had pushed Alex off the stool. It had been a long time ago. David felt at a loss.

  “But, but, we love you.”

  “I know, Dad, but I’m twenty-six. I’m supposed to have my own friends, my own life. Not just attach myself to yours.” She wiped her eyes with a hanky from her sleeve and attempted to smile.

  “What’s brought this on, love?” asked David. “You seemed fine earlier this evening…” Louisa shrugged and reached for a tissue. Her arm nudged the mouse and the screen saver jolted off, revealing Rachel’s blog. David read it.

  “I see,” he said slowly. “This is your homework, right? Your blog homework? And your life isn’t as – as exciting as Rachel’s?” Louisa sniffed and nodded, looking a little sheepish. David straightened up and put his hands on his head. He was responsible for this. He was. He wanted to keep her for himself, for his own means; keep her safe and warm, at home, with him. He loved it when they sat together on the sofa, eating marshmallows and bullying Esther to make cups of tea. He felt like they were a little gang and that no one could touch them. Well, now it seemed that no one wanted to. He finally realised that he wasn’t supposed to be her gang and she wasn’t a line of defence between him and the discussions he needed to have with his wife. He was her dad; he was supposed to be giving her the independence to step out into the world and find her own life – instead he had pushed away her flimsy efforts at attaining things, quietly suggesting that she did them another day and hoping that she’d forget about them. He should have been supporting her activities. Instead, he’d thwarted them at every turn.

  Even now he had the habitual urge to say, “Don’t worry, we’ll find you some friends at the weekend, love. Taggart is on; why don’t you come down with me now and we can sort the rest out next week?” He knew that she would probably be relieved to hear it and come down and do just that. There was a chocolate orange in the fridge with her name on it and Esther would be hovering somewhere near a kettle – it could be very simple. But then he saw his beloved daughter’s swollen eyes and her runny nose. She was looking to him for guidance and it was his job as her father to provide it – even if it meant that his world would have to change too.

  He sat on the bed, struggling with the words. Surely his daughter had to have some friends? “OK, so what do we need to do?”

  Louisa shrugged.

  “What does – Rachel – do of an evening?”

  “She lives in a flat with two friends and they go out and they go away for weekends and friend
s come round and …”

  David laughed and held his hands up, “Hold on, hold on! One change at a time!” Louisa’s face fell. “No,” he corrected himself, “as many changes as you want… Look, I know it’s been tough for you growing up…” David wasn’t sure in what way it might have been tough, but it sounded like a good get out clause for both of them, “…but, Louisa, we haven’t stopped you doing any of those things, have we? I mean, I know it’s not been easy, your, your mother having her stroke an’ all, and I know that you have been a tremendous help to her, but it’s not that… Well, we haven’t demanded you stay, have we? And we could manage without you – we would never want to though of course – I would love it if you could live with us until we get buried in the back garden…”

  Louisa looked at her father and David felt guilty that he was now trying to make her make him feel better. He was still finding it difficult to be the adult in this relationship.

  “Dad, Dad, no, of course you’ve never insisted I stay and I know that Mum can manage most things but…” her voice trailed off, as if she was unsure of what she could get away with saying next.

  The truth was that Louisa probably had been thinking that she was staying at home for her mother’s sake – at least, that is what they tended to tell people if they asked. But what did her mum actually need her to do? She did chop onions and peel potatoes occasionally, but so did her father, and it wasn’t an unreasonable thing to expect from a fellow house occupant. She would hang out clothes or fetch them in if she was home, but most of them were hers anyway. In fact, if David added up all the hot drinks and sandwiches she demanded and the extra towels that required picking up, Louisa probably actually caused her mother work, rather than saved her from it.