by Alison Giles
For once Flora’s face, when I glanced at it, showed undoubted interest.
‘She was very … upset.’ I crumbled an oddment of bread. Then I looked up. ‘Can I tell you about it?’
‘If you’d like to. Here –’ she reached over to the dresser and passed an ashtray – ‘I expect you’ll have a use for this.’
I smiled gratefully. ‘Mother doesn’t approve of me smoking.’
‘Up to you, as far as I’m concerned.’
‘Thanks.’ I fetched my pack of cigarettes from the other side of the room and lit up.
‘Maybe it’s my fault. Maybe I should never have come down.’
Flora gave me a sideways look.
‘What,’ I demanded, ‘is that supposed to mean?’
She pursed her lips. ‘We do enjoy our guilt trips, don’t we?’
‘I thought you were going to be sympathetic?’
‘I’d find it easier if you just gave me the story straight.’
I took a breath, accepting the reprimand.
‘Right.’ The last time I’d said it – in that way – had been in Andrew’s kitchen. Yesterday morning. I smiled at the memory.
I collected my thoughts and, encouraged by nods of unsurprised acknowledgement or occasional confirmation from Flora, embarked on the tale. I told her what Mother had said; recounted my conversation with Leah; recapped on Andrew’s explanation of Father’s dilemma. Finally, I repeated – with some delicate blurring of the reasoning – Elspeth’s blunt conclusion. ‘She seemed to think,’ I said, ‘that Mother was probably quite relieved when Father started … spending time with you.’
Flora looked across at me. ‘Is that what you want to believe or not?’
‘I want the truth.’
She nodded, checking my expression. Then: ‘I’m as confident as I can be,’ she said, ‘that Elspeth’s right.’
I experienced a huge sweep of relief.
‘Don’t misunderstand me,’ she continued. ‘I’m not opting out of responsibility as far as its effect on you is concerned; but let’s say I’d have felt a lot less … comfortable about it if your mother hadn’t—’
‘Encouraged it?’
Again that assessing look. ‘I suppose you could say that.’
I cracked a laugh. ‘It gives a whole new twist. There was she, practically thrusting Dad’s weekend bag at him; and I’ve been feeling sorry for her, angry with her too, for not having what it takes to hold on to him … Well, yes and no …’ I fumbled for words. ‘I mean, if she had, I’d never have met you … and everything …’
God, why was I being so inarticulate? I made an effort to focus. ‘So the arrangement suited her,’ I summed up, in a refrain of previously hazy recognition. Then, with more than a hint of cynicism, ‘Pity she didn’t explain.’
Flora rose and busied herself. I took out another cigarette, debated whether to light it, then stuffed it back in the packet again. ‘In that case,’ I demanded, more of myself than of Flora, ‘why is she so angry with me? What is she blaming me for?’
I fiddled with my lighter, turning it over and over, backwards and forwards, balancing it on its end, catching it as it toppled. ‘Unless of course,’ the thought ballooned into my mind as I skimmed, in memory, over recent weekends and homed in on the image of Mother describing their wedding, those Easter roses, ‘they had to get married.’
I rechecked my mental count to my birthday in a few weeks’ time. That had to be it. I saw it all: Mother seducing Father with her cordon bleu cookery; the inevitability of what must have followed; Father doing the honourable thing …
Flora cut short my speculation. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I’m sure that wasn’t so.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Your father may eventually have realised she wasn’t the person he’d thought she was, but he wasn’t pressured into it.’
It hadn’t been a loveless marriage from the start, then. On balance I was more relieved than disappointed at that explanation falling by the wayside. I didn’t, it occurred to me, really relish the idea of being an unwanted child.
‘In that case,’ I said, ‘what went wrong? What is it I’m supposed to have done?’
Flora was drawing water into the washing-up bowl. ‘Here,’ I said, rousing myself, ‘let me do that.’
I immersed my hands in the suds, the warmth of the water seeping up through my arms. With a damp finger, I flicked back a strand of hair which then flopped forward, spangled, over my forehead again. I blew upwards at it, and the froth erupted into tiny floating bubbles – and one big one, rainbow sided. ‘Ooh, look,’ I said. ‘I haven’t made those since I was a child.’
It was Father who’d brought home the small cylinder of soapy liquid one hot summer lunchtime. He’d taken me into the garden and shown me how to catch a film across the wire circle, then blow … just hard enough.
The image was as clear as if I were there, with him, now. We were standing in the middle of the lawn, he still in his office suit, the sun glinting on the parade of translucent spheres wafting gently upwards, the colours – reds, blues and violets – dancing within them; the magic of it delighting us both.
But then Mother, wiping her hands on a towel, had stepped out through the French windows and remarked crossly to Father: ‘You spoil that child – forever playing with her.’
I looked up, now, from what I was doing. A fly was crawling across the window. I swatted at it with the dishcloth.
‘My God, I hated her,’ I said.
I was aware of Flora, somewhere behind me in the room, pausing. Then she appeared beside me with a teatowel. She picked out a plate from the drying rack.
‘She accused me,’ I said bitterly, ‘of never having loved her.’ I scooped up a knife and scrubbed at it. ‘Maybe she was right.’
Flora’s silence, as we continued our task together, was reassuringly companionable. I rescued the last teaspoon, upended the bowl and watched the water flood into the sink and down the drain.
We lit the promised fire, both of us down on our hands and knees, Flora demonstrating how to wind old newspaper into firelighters and build a pyramid of sticks before balancing logs strategically above them: ‘The air’s got to get to it if it’s to catch.’ It soon did, and we settled in chairs either side of the flames.
Flora picked up a book, flipped it open and transferred the postcard marking her place to the back. She smiled comfortably at me before turning her attention to the page.
I was left alone with my thoughts. Eventually I said, ‘Was it awful of me to say that about my mother?’
Flora looked up.
‘It was just that I was remembering one occasion.’ I recounted it. ‘Do you think … well, it was almost as though she resented me; was jealous of me.’ I recanted hurriedly. ‘It’s crazy, of course. Mothers aren’t jealous of their children.’
‘Whyever not? Particularly of their daughters.’
I stared at her, then giggled. ‘You’re not serious?’
Flora shrugged.
‘Explain,’ I demanded. But I wasn’t sure I needed her to.
‘If she’d produced the son she told me he wanted …’ I mused. If I’d been that son … Thoughts spilled over each other.
‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘I don’t see any sign of Aunt Leah being jealous of Elspeth.’
‘So?’
So why my mother of me, and not my aunt of her daughter? I recalled Elspeth’s comment: her mother had had the sense to marry someone who – how had she put it? – sublimated his sex urges in the greenhouse. I smiled, shaking my head – Elspeth didn’t mince words. But, remembering my conversation with Leah, I wasn’t sure she was right; and even if she were, that wasn’t all there was to marriage. For all that my aunt and uncle played out the hen-pecker and the hen-pecked, I had the sense that this was an act put on for other people’s benefit – a cover in some way for some deep comfortableness with each other which they weren’t about to share with the rest of the world. Even Elspeth, it occurred to me n
ow, hadn’t been able to challenge that. Maybe that was why she’d got out, kept away.
‘I suppose,’ I said, following my train of thought, ‘mothers and daughters are in competition in some way.’ Ruefully I recalled those times when I’d attempted to nudge my way between my parents when Father had been sitting close to Mother. And, on occasions when I’d run to open the door in the evenings, hadn’t I experienced a sort of triumph when he’d swept me up in his arms, leaving Mother hovering in the background?
‘But surely,’ I said, the images clear in my mind, ‘it’s more a case of daughter vying with mother for father’s attention than the other way round?’
Flora placed her book, face down, across the arm of the chair. ‘Maybe she was afraid he cared more for you than for her?’
‘That’s nonsense. He loved us in different ways. Didn’t he?’
‘I suppose she might not have seen it quite like that.’
I considered this, echoes of the weekend just gone reverberating in my mind. ‘You mean she wanted the fathering too?’
Come to think of it, given the picture I’d been piecing together, that made sense. ‘Great,’ I said. ‘Caught up in sibling rivalry with my own mother.’ A thought struck me. ‘Presumably she didn’t imagine that father had designs on me –’ I searched for words – ‘in any other way?’
Flora smiled. ‘Far more likely you simply reminded her, once you started growing up a bit, that she was getting older.’
I pondered. ‘And she didn’t like it. Still –’ I gestured a protest – ‘I could hardly help that.’
The logs were well alight, glowing red now. I stared into them, at the wafering created as they burned. ‘You know,’ I said, ‘being realistic, I can, I suppose, imagine other reasons too why she might have been jealous – or at least envious – of me. My education, my career. She wasn’t exactly very academic herself, never totally at ease, for example, with Dad’s parents; pretended to despise their … intellectual interests, I suppose you’d call them.’ I thought about it; remembered Gran valiantly making conversation with her about cake recipes or the season’s fashion colours – Mum Vogue smart, Gran in an old cardy over the print dress she resurrected each summer.
‘And at home she always opted out when Dad helped me with homework. Sometimes one subject led to another … exploring ideas, that sort of thing. It didn’t happen often though.’ I leaned forward and picked up the poker, idling it in my hands. ‘I think I was embarrassed to let her see … even admit to myself perhaps … I’m talking about my teens now … that I was enjoying just chatting with him.’ I prodded among the flames. ‘At the time I was only aware of this awful feeling of disloyalty. Now I’m not so sure. Maybe there was more to it than that.’ I took a vicious lunge at a log, splitting it. Sparks flew up.
‘Mind you.’ I sat back, allowing my shoulders to relax. ‘I don’t know where all this is getting us. Even if Mother was jealous … envious of me, that had nothing to do with Dad turning to you. Which we’ve already decided she was happy about.’ I shook my head. ‘I can’t see there’s any connection between the two.’
Maybe, it was to occur to me later, I wasn’t at that stage, ready to do so.
I cooked supper for Andrew that evening. He sat on a stool watching me, his elbows resting on the table, his chin in his hands.
Feeling disconcertingly self-conscious, almost as though I were acting out a part, I said, ‘This is all terribly domesticated. But then,’ I added, ‘you’re used to it of course.’
‘If Ginny were doing it, she’d either have me helping or bundle me out. No ceremony between brother and sister.’
‘Something else for me to envy you for,’ I said, sprinkling salt on the broccoli. ‘Having a brother and sister. Half my problems probably arise from being an only child.’ I told him some of what Flora and I had talked about. ‘Too much on one pair of shoulders.’
‘I take it,’ said Andrew, choosing not to lead me any deeper into it all, ‘you’ll want a dozen when the time comes.’
‘Or none.’
Unperturbed, Andrew got up and crossed the room. Reaching round me, he placed his hands over my stomach. ‘You’d look great, pregnant,’ he said.
‘Do you mind? Long time before I start thinking about things like that.’ I wriggled free. ‘Now get off.’ I pushed him away and, picking up a wooden spatula, waved it at him.
He dropped back a few paces and raised his arms in mock surrender. ‘Now that,’ he said, laughing, ‘is what I recognise as being really domesticated. Never,’ he retreated to the safety of the far side of the table, ‘argue with a woman in her kitchen.’
I chased him. ‘For that,’ I said, thrusting the spatula at him, ‘you can take over at the stove.’
CHAPTER 22
I came to the conclusion – lying awake beside Andrew that night – that there was nothing to be gained by chewing over the past any further.
It all seemed clear enough now. Father – as Andrew had forcefully reminded me men did – wanted a woman, both in bed and out of it, not a dependent child. Why he’d put up with Mother playing at being a wife for as long as he had was a mystery; maybe the timing of his eventual decision not to had little to do with anything other than opportunity. There was nothing to suggest he’d been actively looking; maybe he didn’t even realise what he was missing until he came face to face with the alternative – Flora.
Hardly the bimbo Mother assumed. Maybe my budding adolescence did more than remind her the years were piling on; perhaps in Father’s fondness for me she saw a predilection for a younger woman. How wrong she was! It wasn’t something long-legged and nubile he craved, but warmth and companionship: someone who shared, or at least valued, his interests; who was sensitive to his needs and feelings.
Strange that I should be so sure – never having seen him and Flora together – that that was how they had been with each other. But, then again, not so strange – I’d got to know Flora now, and, yes, in some almost real, and enhanced, sense, him too.
I turned my head sideways. Andrew was sleeping peacefully. I could do worse, in my own relationships, I thought, than take a leaf out of Flora’s book.
I stared back up at the ceiling again. And what about Mum? It was a bit startling to have to take on board the idea that she’d been – still was? – jealous of me. Did she really think I’d never loved her, cared about her? Whatever I’d said earlier today, I surely hadn’t meant it? Not in general terms. It had just been hurt and anger; the heat of the moment; over-reaction. But – I pulled the covers closer under my chin and turned on my side – I supposed I had loved Father more. No doubt she’d been jealous of that – of us both. I felt my eyes closing. Well; that had certainly changed once Flora came on the scene. After that, surely Mother couldn’t have been in any doubt it was she I cared about, supported …
I roused myself to prepare breakfast for Andrew next morning.
‘Very cosy,’ he commented. ‘There’s usually bedlam here at this time of the day – Ginny chasing around looking for lost socks; Tom and Justin arguing over whatever gadget they’ve found in the cornflakes packet …’
He downed the last forkful of bacon and egg. ‘Makes me think—’ He broke off as he glanced at his watch. ‘Must go. Got an indomitable old dear coming in at nine – and she’s always on the dot.’
I was round at Flora’s by ten.
‘I could do with going into town,’ she said, as we debated how to spend our time.
It was market day. The place bristled with people and stalls, those selling genuine local produce vastly outnumbered by peripatetic vendors of the cheap and cheerful.
I glanced at Flora as we meandered through the crowds, allowing out attention to be caught now and then by some item of bric-a-brac or a secondhand gardening tool.
She returned my look quizzically.
‘I’m waiting for you to say something about the good old days,’ I said.
‘When this would have been a real country market?’ Sh
e shrugged philosophically. ‘No point harking back. Things change.’
True, I thought.
Sidestepping a pile of litter at the edge of the pavement, I persuaded her into the local coffee shop. We sat over frothing hot chocolate and a slice each of home-made shortbread.
‘This is deliciously self-indulgent,’ I said. ‘The prospect of going back to work next week—’
‘I thought you thoroughly enjoyed your job?’
‘Yes, of course.’ I did. No question about it. ‘It’s a rather smug feeling though –’ elbows on the table, I smiled complacently – ‘sitting here while everyone else is grinding away … But no, you’re right. I’d miss it if it weren’t there to go back to.’
I looked across at her. ‘Have you never worked – apart from the bit of nursing you mentioned?’
Flora tipped her head on one side. ‘You find that strange?’
‘Well, even Mother,’ I said, ‘until she was married—’
‘I suppose you could call looking after my aunt a job.’
I considered. ‘That was a bit hard on you, wasn’t it?’
‘Not really. Her mind was as active as ever up to the very last. And she had so many fascinating friends – of all generations – with whom I was expected to keep up intellectually. I imagine it was just as stimulating a period in my life as your job makes yours now.’
I gave a moue of acknowledgement. ‘I see.’
Flora laughed suddenly. ‘And she insisted I do all the things she’d loved to, but no longer could.’
‘What! Disappear off on a Grand Tour?’
‘Not quite. Mostly art exhibitions, theatre; occasionally –’ her expression became almost dreamy as she stared towards the window – ‘dances – the old-fashioned formal kind with long evening gloves …’ She turned back. ‘And she adored the motor car. Broke her heart when she eventually let the old Bentley go.’ Amusement spread across her face as she recalled, ‘You weren’t so far off the mark when you guessed there was a would-be racing driver lurking inside me. Rallying. That became my big love. And Auntie encouraged it. We’d move her chair over to the window so she could sit and wave us off.’