Chances

by Freya North

  She reckoned she could finish her book by closing time. She was going to go to Michelle’s tonight to help with tomorrow’s BBQ. She was seeing her mum on Sunday. She hadn’t thought about bank holiday Monday yet. Candy perhaps. Something – she’d have to have something organized. She hadn’t had a customer since mid-afternoon and now it was tea-time. She went to the back, poured herself the last of the iced coffee, a jug of which she made each morning. She drank far more iced coffee than she ever drank hot.

  Buy de-caff.

  She wrote a Post-it and stuck it to the fridge door and went back into the shop to find Jonty waiting patiently by the till.

  ‘Hiya,’ he gave his awkward half-height wave. He’d had a haircut and yet his fringe appeared longer than ever. And very black. All the more so because the T-shirt emblazoned with a skeleton was incongruously yellow.

  ‘Hi?’

  ‘I – er.’ He shuffled and mumbled and fiddled with the erasers. ‘This is totally strawberryish,’ he marvelled.

  ‘Sniff the green one.’

  ‘Wow.’ He sniffed again. ‘Wow – that’s mega-appley.’

  ‘Weird, aren’t they.’

  ‘How much are they?’

  ‘Fifty pence.’

  He started rooting around in his pocket.

  ‘Don’t be daft, Jonty – have one,’ she said, ‘take a couple.’

  ‘Seriously?’ She might as well have offered him free gold ingots.

  ‘They cost me pennies.’

  He chose an apple one. And a strawberry one too. Vita doubted very much whether he’d actually take them to school.

  ‘I got my GCSEs,’ he told her. And by the time she’d finally coaxed out of him that the two he had taken a year early both achieved A*, he’d turned the colour of the strawberry eraser.

  ‘That’s amazing!’ she said. And she thought, Oliver must be cock-a-hoop. And then she thought, DeeDee would have been so very proud.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘y’know. I’d better scoot.’

  She looked at him. ‘Nice to see you – thanks for calling in.’

  And Jonty very nearly left it at that.

  ‘Um, Vita.’ His voice had changed. And so had his demeanour. He was standing tall, looking right at her. ‘I just wanted to say – you weren’t to know. About the dishwasher.’

  ‘It’s OK, Jonty – honestly, I understa—’

  But he cut her off. He raised his hand as if stopping traffic. ‘The really really stupid thing about it is that Mum and Dad used to argue the whole time about it. It used to really wind Mum up because Dad was so crap at putting things in. And it used to totally get on Dad’s nerves the way Mum was obsessed with doing it her way. The whole time.’

  He looked at Vita who was looking right back at him.

  ‘I wish my dad would use the frikkin’ thing – we both hate bloody washing up. Did you see how many teaspoons and mugs we have? We buy loads – and pile them up for Mrs Blackthorne to do. She’s our cleaner.’

  Vita smiled. It was she who washed all the mugs, all the time, in the shop. She missed not having a dishwasher at Pear Tree Cottage. She’d loved stacking Tim’s. She didn’t remember whether they’d ever fallen out about it. At the time, she never really noticed how equally or otherwise the division of labour fell.

  ‘Anyway,’ Jonty said, ‘it’s just – I know this sounds bizarre – but it’s just that we haven’t actually used it since Mum died. Not once. Not a single time.’ He gave Vita a contorted smile as if he’d just confessed the most excruciatingly embarrassing thing.

  ‘So Dad was a bit –’ He stumbled for vocabulary. ‘A bit –’ He paused. ‘You know what, he sort of overreacted, I think. If you want my opinion. For what it’s worth.’

  ‘I wish I’d known,’ Vita said regretfully.

  ‘I wish I’d thought to tell you,’ said Jonty. ‘I wish we had. But in some ways it did some good. It – it –’ He fumbled around for the words. And when they came he spoke them with a deep American accent. ‘It, like, totally broke the spell of the dishwasher, man.’

  Vita laughed.

  Jonty looked at the floor. He seemed to shrink back to teenager stature again, as if he’d been granted just a few minutes of time as an adult. ‘Anyway, I wanted you to know that. And I wanted you to know that Dad’s been in a crap mood. And I wanted you to know that too. In case, you know, he phones. Or in case you feel like phoning him? Or something. I dunno. I don’t know how these things are done. I don’t have a girlfriend – thank God.’

  Vita was overwhelmed with the same compulsion to hug the kid that she’d experienced at his house. But the table was between them, as were all the words and sentiments with which he’d come in, all on his own, to deliver. All she could do was give him the eraser that was mega-bananary too.

  * * *

  It was the upturned mug full of sedimenty water that did it. That, and the forks still with food gunk on them. It was very late. Oliver was unloading the dishwasher which he’d used for the first time, cursing the thing for not cleaning properly. And then he thought, I should have let Vita stack it last week. She’d’ve known just how to do it. And then he thought, Oh God – I thought of Vita in the first instance. Vita came first, into my mind. And he went up to bed and picked up the photo of DeeDee and sat on the floor holding it in his hands as he wept. But DeeDee just kept on smiling, over his shoulder. Smiling and smiling that fantastic wonky grin of hers.

  Oliver slept fitfully for an hour or two, soon wide awake in the small hours.

  He dressed silently.

  He left the house soundlessly, put the car into neutral and rolled down the drive without the engine on. Then he drove away as quietly as could and drove fast to Wynfordbury Hall, parking up by the great iron gates. The moon picked out the swirls and curlicues, transforming them from metal into lace. They were shut. He didn’t expect them to be open, he didn’t need them to be, he didn’t even check. He walked alongside the wall, trailing his hand against the lichen-licked stones until he found the place he was looking for. You’d’ve thought, by now, all these years later, they’d’ve fixed it. But they hadn’t. And so he climbed, a little less easily than he’d done the first time, but he made it up and over and soon enough he was walking through the trees in the moonlight.

  The Cowgirl

  Daylight can be harsh. Daylight can also cast shadows over what seemed a good idea at night. Oliver, therefore, made a further trip to Wynfordbury Hall on the morning of bank holiday Sunday, approaching through the gates this time, along with the other visitors. It was so hot that many folk were choosing to picnic in the shade of the arboretum rather than on the exposed swathes of grass. As he passed the Wynfordbury Yew, he could hear the squeals and scamper of children inside it – a living, mysterious, secret playground which every child should have the opportunity to experience. It was heartening to see so many people, the families in particular, enjoying the great outdoors and eschewing the tat and grime of the bank holiday funfair on the other side of town. He walked away from the yew, on towards the outer reaches of the estate. He walked with purpose. He needed to check something, from his sortie two nights ago. Check it was still as he’d intended it to be. And then he was going to call by Vita’s. And if she wasn’t in, he was going to phone her. And if there was no answer, he’d wait until she was home.

  *

  Ruth Whitbury didn’t trust it when her daughter was so conscientiously upbeat, skitting over direct questions as if they were puddles on a path, smiling as if her life depended on it, breezing over how life was treating her, laughing excessively over things that warranted only a mere chuckle. They were linking arms, the two of them, strolling along the river path. They were walking out of town and along to the Swan Inn for Sunday lunch. Can’t do a thing on an empty stomach, Ruth thought. She intended to feed her daughter and then, over dessert, she’d pull out of her whatever was caught so deeply inside. Just as her husband had managed the splinters when Vita was a little girl. He’d distract Vita with a
choc-ice and the television and then he’d deftly needle and tweeze the splinter out without his daughter realizing.

  They chose a picnic table near to the water’s edge. They were lucky it was free – many people were having to loll on the grass, with their pints at precarious angles on the ground and their ploughman’s lunches perched on their laps. Vita insisted on spending a long time larkily discussing whether, having ordered two – one ham, one stilton – she should have asked for ploughmens’ lunches. She was still hanging on this thread when she’d all but finished her summer pudding.

  ‘It’s like my friends the Boardmans,’ Vita said. ‘If I’m talking about more than one of them – should I refer to them as the Boardmen?’

  Her mother thought this was a tangent too far. ‘And talking of friends, darling – how’s your young man? Well, I know you said he’s older – but I’m ancient so he’s still a whippersnapper to me.’

  Vita just nodded. Nodded at the swans, at the water, at the last spoonful on her plate, at her mother.

  ‘He’s well, is he?’

  ‘He’s . . . It’s not going to work out. What a shame!’ and Vita smiled her way through it.

  ‘That is a pity,’ her mother said.

  ‘He’s . . . It’s not the right time for him, Mum,’ Vita said.

  ‘Why? Did he tell you so?’

  ‘No,’ Vita said slowly, looking away from her mother’s arched eyebrow. ‘Not exactly. He didn’t need to. You can tell.’

  ‘You can? How?’

  ‘He’s still grieving.’

  ‘He always will, darling.’

  ‘Exactly,’ Vita said quietly.

  ‘Grief takes on a variety of different shades,’ her mother said. ‘It’s nothing for you to be frightened of.’

  ‘I’m not frightened,’ said Vita.

  ‘Are you sure it’s not you who has the problem with his grief?’

  Vita felt irritated. This was not the sort of conversation to be having with one’s mother and certainly not on a gorgeous bank holiday Sunday.

  ‘Mum – I must look after myself. I don’t want to set myself up for another fall. I don’t want to be second best to another woman ever again – living or dead.’

  Her mother thought about it, thought about her daughter. She knew her so well, far better than Vita thought. ‘I don’t doubt you can look after yourself.’

  ‘I can. So can we just drop it? It’s not easy – any of this. Talking to you about – this. I didn’t think I’d be on my own in my mid-thirties. I thought I’d be happy with a young family of my own. So please – can we just drop it? Oliver was lovely – really lovely. But maybe three years isn’t so long since his wife died. He’s unavailable.’

  ‘Darling, you need to accept that you will be between two women for some time. You will stand there, looking over your shoulder at the woman your ex takes after you – and you will look in front of you at the woman your new man has had before you. I don’t think it’s the men who are your problem – it’s their women. Living – or dead.’ She paused. ‘It’s not a competition, you know. Have a little faith, darling – please.’

  ‘Drop it, mother,’ Vita muttered.

  So Ruth decided to drop it. She didn’t want to run the risk of doing more harm than good. She’d done so before – pleading with her daughter to take Tim back the first time Vita left him. ‘Shall we move on?’ Ruth stood and offered her arm for her daughter to link hers with.

  I shall move on.

  ‘Let’s!’ and Vita’s smile, unnervingly beatific, was rigor mortised to her face once more.

  Vita could hear her house phone ringing as she unlocked the door but it had stopped by the time she was inside. Then her mobile started up. It’ll be Mum, checking I’m home OK.

  No, it’s not. It’s Oliver.

  Let it go through to voicemail.

  Do not let this call go through to voicemail.

  Vita knew precisely how many rings she had left to decide.

  Her mum’s voice was in her head. But so too was Jonty’s. Generations apart – but strangely united.

  Come on! Just answer it! If you bottle, once you’ve done so, just say, Oops, I have to go.

  She closed her eyes, took a breath, and answered.

  ‘Hullo?’

  ‘Hullo, missy.’

  ‘Hullo, Oliver.’

  ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m well – and you?’

  ‘I’m well. Jonty always says, “I’m good” – that is rich American, but it’s poor English.’

  That’s so Oliver. ‘Poor kid! I bet you never let him use “random”, do you?’ Chatting. I’m chatting. This is pointless.

  Oliver laughed. ‘Certainly not.’

  A pause. Quick!

  ‘Vita – I –’ Bugger. He’d practised this and now he was rummaging around for the words the way he’d ferret around in the glove compartment for his house keys. He’d invested those missing words with the potential to unlock. Where the fuck were they?

  ‘It’s OK,’ Vita was saying because she didn’t want to hear – stuff. ‘It’s fine. I understand. Honestly. No biggie.’

  ‘No – it’s not fine. I wanted to see you – just to explain.’

  ‘I –’ Then Vita thought, No. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to explain. It’s fine. I’m fine. I understand.’

  And then Oliver thought, No. He thought, No – I’m not going to let you go so easily. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Sorry,’ he said. He said, ‘that just won’t do.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Stay there – I’m coming over.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Bye.’

  Moments later, he was at her door. He’d made the calls from around the corner. She was tempted to dart out of the kitchen door, wasps, pears, whatever. But then she thought of all those conversations she’d never had the chance to have with Tim, precious words which had remained trapped and ricocheting around her head, unheard, un-exorcised. It’s called Closure, she thought rather grandly. And then she thought, Just answer the bloody door and whatever he has to say, take it on the chin. Whatever you hear, make it useful for the long run, in the closure stakes. So she opened the door slowly, just a crack, as if he might be Jehova’s Witnesses or, worse, that odd chap wanting to talk about speed bumps from the neighbourhood scheme she wished she’d never joined.

  ‘Hullo,’ Oliver said, peering in at the half a face he could see.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘I don’t want to come in – it’s OK,’ he said, ‘but I want you to come with me.’

  She looked at him, suspiciously.

  ‘Please?’

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Please.’ No question mark this time.

  She left him on the doorstep, went straight past her door keys and through into the kitchen where she gave herself a moment. Come on, girl, she told herself. Outside, in the branches of the pear tree, DeeDee’s wasp catchers were doing their job. Outside, on her doorstep, Oliver was waiting. She retraced her steps, picked up her keys and left the house to see Oliver already walking away down the path.

  He drove her directly to his home.

  They didn’t go in through the front door; this time, he took her around to the side gate and walked ahead of her into his back garden. There was a bowl of strawberries on the wooden table, a jug of Pimm’s, a plate of shortbread biscuits. Two chairs were set, with plump floral cushions. She knew just who they were by.

  ‘They cost silly money in comparison to the sensible green wipeable ones from the garden centre,’ he said, as if reading her mind.

  ‘They’re Cath Kidston,’ Vita said. Just as DeeDee had said to him. Fait accompli. What’s the problem? Men!

  ‘Please,’ he said, motioning to the chair he’d just drawn back. ‘Come and sit in the lap of Cath Kidston.’

  He poured her some Pimm’s. He swiped away a wasp and offered her a strawberry, the biscuits. And they sat, quietly, not knowing who was meant to say what next.
<
br />   A barrage of thoughts racketed through her head. If he was going to dump me, wouldn’t he have done so on my doorstep? He wouldn’t have done the Pimm’s and the strawberries and the cushions thing, surely? She glanced at him shyly. He looked relaxed. Looking out at his garden. She followed his gaze.

  ‘Blimey, your garden’s in a bit of a state, Mr B,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I know,’ he said, ‘you’re right. It is. But I’ve booked a bloke to come in for a few days this week.’

  She nodded. She thought that was the end of that and wondered what to converse politely on next. But then Oliver started talking again.

  ‘I’ve hardly been out here since DeeDee died. It was her territory. I haven’t wanted to come out here – but then I thought of Pimm’s, how I haven’t had Pimm’s yet this summer. And I thought about strawberries and how comfortable these second-mortgage cushions are. And I thought to myself how much I wanted to sit out here, on them, on the last bank holiday Sunday, sipping Pimm’s – with you. So!’

  Vita stirred and stirred the drink, crushing the mint against the side of the glass, sucking thoughtfully on a boozy chunk of apple.

  ‘So there you have it,’ said Oliver and he necked his entire glassful down. He replenished it. ‘Vita,’ he said and this time he reached for her arm – his lovely way of putting his hand over her wrist – ‘the other night, I couldn’t believe how out of sorts I felt. The last few weeks with you – I’ve felt so relaxed, happy. Then, here – suddenly I was on a knife edge. I just didn’t realize that there are still things that are a first, for me, after DeeDee. They’re milestones, however bizarre or banal they might seem. Some are more logical – the first birthdays, Christmas. Some are odd – the first online delivery from Ocado, selected by me, unpacked by me. Some loom large ages in advance – you dread them, prepare for them, get through them – the change of a year, for instance. Others – like the other week – come out of the blue. I’m sorry. For shouting. For not explaining.’ He let go of her wrist and stroked her forearm, covered her hand with his. ‘I owe you that honesty. I’ve missed you.’

  And I’ve missed you too.