The Rise and Fall of a Domestic Diva

by Sarah May

  ‘What dog?’ Joe, distracted still by their conversation, briefly scanned the garden.

  ‘That one therelooks like a dachshund.’

  This time he looked properly. ‘I don’t see no dog, Jess.’

  The dachshund had gone.

  Chapter 29

  By the time they got to the beach there was a sea haze beginning to drift in, muffling the sun.

  Jessica stayed up in the beach hut Joe and Lenny had bought while Joe took the boys out in the dinghy. She stood outside the hut, her hand raised over her eyes because of the glare coming off the sea, and watched Joe tow the dinghy out while Arthur and Findlay attempted to coordinate the oars. The unnerving flat of a dead calm was taking its toll on people and, as Jessica stood there, at least six groups of women with young children started to leave. Even the emaciated teenager who had been running down the rocks screaming when they’d first arrived, trying to dodge the empty beer cans that a group of friends was hurling at him, stopped suddenly and slid off the rocks.

  The group left soon after this and their departure left the beach feeling strangely silent. Jessica went back into the hut and made tea on the gas stove, her eyes scanning the hut as she waited for the kettle to boil. The hut felt much more like Lenny and Joe’s than the house on Marine Drive. The house on Marine DriveJessica realised now for the first timefelt too big. The house on Marine Drive had been bought after they’d sold their respective businesses, in anticipation of a family of their own. She wondered why they stayed.

  There wasn’t much in the huta shelf full of shells and smaller bits of driftwood, with seagull feathers stuck in the cracks, like trophies; a pair of binoculars hanging from a nail by the door and a collection of buckets, spades, kites and fishing nets bought for Arthur from the beach shop that backed onto the hut, and a series of photographs on the back wall of the Grand after the Brighton bomb in ‘84.

  As the kettle boiled, a woman in white espadrilles and white T-shirt dress with gold tassels stuck her head round the door.

  ‘Oh,’ she said, surprised to see Jessica. ‘Joe around?’

  ‘He’s in the sea.’

  ‘Oh,’ the woman said, exhaling smoke into the interior of the beach hut and smiling vacantly through it at her.

  ‘I’m Jessica.’

  ‘Jessica?’

  ‘His daughter.’

  The woman picked something out carefully from between her teeth. ‘Lovely.’ She smiled awkwardly. ‘I thought so.’

  She stood on the threshold of the hut, swaying slightly, the hand that wasn’t holding the cigarette clasped tightly round her waist as she stared out to sea, looking for any sign of Joe.

  Jessica, pouring herself a cup of tea, had the impression that the woman spent a lot of time hanging round the hut in carefully contrived outfits, waiting for sightings of Joe. She found herself smiling and the woman, turning round, caught the smile.

  ‘I’d better go.’

  Jessica nodded.

  ‘Tell him I called by, will you? Tell him I called by about Sunday.’

  ‘Who called by?’

  ‘OhAlexa. Alexa did.’

  Jessica nodded again and watched her leave. There was a definite resonance of Linda in Alexashe wondered if Joe had noticed.

  A cup of tea in her hand, she went outside again.

  In the hut next door, Alexa’s legs lay dark and glistening with a glittery oil that defied the absence of any real sun. Alexa’s legs, stretched out on a plantation lounger that was half in, half out of the beach hut, was all that was visible of Alexa, whose toenails, Jessica noted, were painted gold to match the tassels on her T-shirt dress.

  The snack hut behind them was playing a local radio station, and she heard the DJ advertising a hot-air balloon show and the fact that the Shoreham Theatre was staging Basil Brush and the Pirates of the Caribbean that summer.

  There were people in the water still, and she could hear the bang and drone of a motorboat crossing the bay westwards. Beyond this, she made out a small dog, yapping. She thought it might be coming from Alexa’s hutAlexa looked as if she might keep small dogs. Then the sound vanished.

  She went back inside to check on the timeit was 3.30: they should be getting back. Sipping at the rest of her tea, she took in the picture of the Grand. Joe had been in Brighton with Lenny the night the Grand went up. The night the Grand went up was the night Linda died.

  Jessica swung away from the Grand collapsing in on itself, in black and white, back towards the sea.

  There were three dinghies out on the water nowone of them was making its way back to the shore. She walked slowly down the beach towards the water’s edge, letting herself slip down the banks of pebbles marking the year’s high tides.

  The tide had turned and was going out now, leaving a strip of wet sand on an otherwise pebble beach for her feet to sink into as she watched the waves wash the blue and yellow dinghy up on the shore. Arthur was climbing over the side, yelling at no one and nothing in particular as he flung himself belly first into the cold water and came up gasping. Joe, laughing, started to splash him.

  Jessica shouted, ‘Dad,’ but Arthur came up again, laughing and swallowing mouthfuls of water, trying to speak then giving up.

  The three of them made their way reluctantly out of the water, with Findlay pulling the dinghy as the day lost the last of its brightness and the mist turned to a fine, hot drizzle.

  Jessica followed the boys and the dinghy listlessly back to the beach hut where Joe had already changed.

  As they walked back to Marine Drive, the tarmac on the pavement was still soft with the heat as the drizzle turned finally to rain.

  Chapter 30

  Margery woke up.

  She didn’t know where she was. It felt strange and smelt strange.

  It wasn’t East Leeke and it wasn’t Prendergast Roadthe two places most of her life happened in.

  To make matters worse, there was somebody padding around in the green and beige area just beyond her peripheral vision. After a while she made out a pair of grey leggings and a shapeless pink sweatshirt. It might be EdithEdith cleaned in an outfit not dissimilar to that, but Edith wore mauve, never pink. Pink, she said, clashed with her varicose veins and the burst blood vessels on her face. And it wasn’t Kate. The pink and grey shape was shifting towards her, talking.

  ‘Margery? It is Margery, isn’t it? I didn’t wake you, did I?’

  Margery made an effort to haul herself up in the sofa until she was sitting right back in it and her feet had left the ground.

  ‘It’s coming up to four,’ the woman’s voice carried on. Then, ‘I’m Joe’s wifeLenny. I bet Joe made his sangria, didn’t he? He says he puts loads of lemonade in it, but he doesn’t.’

  At last Lenny came into focus, and what a bloody mess she washer hair was wet, and she wasn’t wearing any make-up. Margery couldn’t even conceive of dying in a state like that, let alone receiving visitors.

  Lenny must have read her face because the next minute she said, ‘I only came in about forty minutes ago and went straight upstairs to shower.’ She paused. ‘Can I get you a tea or anything?’

  Margery nodded, distracted.

  ‘Sorry I wasn’t here earlierI had to go to Birmingham to see one of our soldiers and their family.’

  ‘Birmingham?’

  Lenny nodded. ‘I run a charity for ex-soldiersWalking Wounded.’

  ‘Does Joe mind?’ Margery asked.

  Lenny laughed. ‘Does Joe mind what?’

  ‘You out and about all the time?’

  ‘No idea,’ Lenny said, disappearing into the kitchen. ‘Anyway,’ she called out a few minutes later, ‘we’d go nuts cooped up in this house together, day in day out.’

  Margery didn’t respond to this. She couldn’t imagine anything nicer than being cooped up with someone day in, day outand what was the point, anyway, in finding the perfect mate only to lead separate lives. She didn’t understand it, she really didn’t.

  She sat in silence
as the first few drops of rain fell gently against the window. The corners of the room had gone dark, and the conifers outside had started blowing over to one sideit was strange to think that they had eaten lunch outside.

  ‘Anyway,’ Lenny’s voice came through from the kitchen, ‘Joe’s got his garden and allotment.’ She appeared in the lounge doorway, wiping her hands on a towel with a map of Devon on it. ‘It was the first timetodaythat some of those soldiers had seen their wives since getting back from Iraq. It’s difficult when there’s no homecomingpublic or private.’

  ‘Terrible, isn’t it?’ Margery said, watching the rain get steadier through the window, her mind drifting to other wars, other soldiers…other homecomings.

  ‘It wasn’t much different after the Falklands.’

  Margery stared at her drying her hands, the rolled-back sleeves of the sweatshirt a darker pink in places where they’d got wet. ‘They’ll be wet,’ she said.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It’s rainingthey’ll be wet.’

  ‘Is it?’ Lenny stared through the window.

  ‘That your kettle?’

  She jerked away from the doorframe she’d been leaning against and ran through to the kitchen.

  Margery continued to watch the conifers blow over to one side and the rain spit against the window, but her nostrils were suddenly full of the smell of paint; a soft rosy paint that her mother and aunt had repainted most of the house in, in time for Tom’s homecoming. They’d been going through the motions of celebration ever since they’d got the letter giving them a datean exact datewhen they could expect to see Tom again because Tom was alive. Tom had survived when others hadn’t and that was reason enough to celebrate, to repaint the house a soft rosy pink when they still thoughtbefore the car pulled upthat there was some part of Tom intact enough to appreciate being surrounded by soft rosy pink. How old had she been? Five? She remembered kneeling at a window for what seemed like ages; she remembered the pins and needles and not daring to get up and stretch her legs in case she missed the car pulling up. It was the car she was waiting for, not Tom. They didn’t get many cars up their street. Then the car did pull up and she started shouting and everybody was suddenly franticall the women desperately pulling aprons off and tearing at the scarves on their heads. She wondered what it must have looked like to Tom with all those faces at the downstairs window. He probably hadn’t seen any of themalthough he said later, much later, that he’d seen hers.

  Then Tom had got out of the car.

  Someone had helped him.

  And at that moment, everyone had known that the new rosy pink walls probably wouldn’t mean all that much to Tom. Sam, who’d been hanging streamers and couldn’t even see out the window, left off and jumped down from the chair she’d been standing on, shoving the rest of the streamers in the cutlery drawer.

  They weren’t excited any more, just afraid.

  The man who brought Tom in didn’t take his hat off and spent barely five minutes on the doorstep with Aunt Teresa, explaining what they should do and what they shouldn’t dofor Tom, to Tom.

  ‘You’re thinking of someone,’ Lenny said, putting two cups of tea on the coffee table that had a basket on it with some wrinkled apples in it.

  ‘My cousin Tomhe was taken prisoner in Burma during the Second World War. He came to live with us after.’ Margery stared at the steam rising from the cup of tea, hearing her aunt Teresa’s voice saying over and over again, ‘What they did to him was terrible; it was terrible,’ until the rest of them had had enough and told her to shut up. ‘Everybody realised,’ Margery said out loud, ‘that it would have been better if he hadn’t survived.’

  Lenny nodded. ‘That happens a lot. It’s an awful moment. When families realise that the person they’ve been hoping against hope comes back alive, does come back alive, and that their life is going to be more of a burden to them than their death would have been.’ She paused. ‘If you see what I mean.’

  ‘I do see.’ Margery watched Lenny lean forward and pick up her cup of tea. ‘Somehow he survived, came homeand there was us lot wishing he was dead. Especially Teresahis mothershe wished him dead more than any of us. I wished him dead as well, in the beginning, just because everyone else did, but then I was only five or something. After a time, though, I got used to him. The only person he didn’t bother was his dadUncle Tedand nobody had expected that. Ted did everything for himeverythingbecause his mum wouldn’t go near him. We just had to teach ourselves about Tom because we never heard from the authorities again…’

  Margery picked up her tea and took a few sips, not caring when she burnt her mouth, wondering why she’d said what she’d just said to Lenny. It was the first time she had talked to anybody about Tom. She looked around her, stunned, as though she had been talking in her sleep and somebody had just told her what she’d been talking about.

  ‘Walking Woundedmy charitydo more grief counselling with families whose relatives come back alive than they do with families who have lost people in action. It’s just not something people think about.’

  Margery nodded, but wasn’t really listening any more.

  Then Lenny stood up suddenly. ‘They’re home.’

  Margery watched her leave the room then stood up herself, half expecting to see the black Ford pull up and Tom step out. It took her a whileeven with her face pressed up to the glass, staring straight at themto make out Joe, Jessica and the children, wet from the sea and the rain, filing one by one into the porch.

  Even after the front door was shut and the house became suddenly full of voices, Margery carried on standing at the window, waiting.

  Chapter 31

  ‘When did you get home?’ Joe asked Lenny, coming in from the rain.

  ‘About an hour ago.’

  ‘You all right, love?’ he said, shaking the water off himself in the hallway.

  Lenny nodded. ‘Come on inyou’re soaked, the lot of you.’

  Jessica moved to kiss her, but then hesitated.

  They drew away from each other, smiling awkwardly.

  As Jessica disappeared with the children upstairs to the bathroom to dry them off, Joe grabbed hold of Lenny’s wrist and pulled her towards him, kissing her quickly, instinctively.

  Lenny pushed him away. ‘You’re wet.’

  ‘So?’ Joe pulled her towards him again, harder this time.

  ‘Joe…’

  He let her go, wiping at his face with his arm. ‘Sowhat’s up?’

  ‘Nothing’s up,’ she said, turning her back on him and disappearing into the kitchen.

  Jessica came back downstairs. ‘Are the boys all right with that old tin garage of yours up in the spare room?’ she asked Joe.

  ‘They’re fine,’ Joe said, putting the teapot on the table.

  ‘Where’s Margery?’

  ‘In the lounge,’ he said, turning round suddenly to Lenny. ‘Will you just sit downrelax.’

  He pulled out a chair and waited for Lenny to sit down.

  ‘I’ll get the cake outyou made cake, didn’t you?’

  ‘Just stay where you areI can get the cake,’ Joe ordered, irritable.

  The next minute Lenny was up and already at the cupboard.

  ‘Lenny…’

  ‘You know I can’t sit still, so what’s the point?’

  ‘We should go,’ Jessica put in. ‘I’ve got to get Margery and Findlay back, and IKEA are delivering that desk we bought for Ellie between six and eight.’

  There was the sound of feet running down the stairs and Arthur calling out, ‘Mumcan we have some cake?’

  The kitchen was suddenly full of people and the sound of crockery being put on the table, and chairs being scraped across the floor.

  Arthur’s happy, Jessica thought, watching him climb up onto the chair and take a slice of cakehe’s happy.

  The thought of driving back to London in the rainthe thought of the maisonettewas unbearable.

  People were staring at her. Had somebody said something she wa
s meant to respond to? This was happening a lot at the moment. She didn’t hear when people spoke to herand she had to do better than this; had to pay attention or they’d think she wasn’t coping, and then there’d be no end to anything.

  Arthur was saying, ‘Mumcan I have another piece?’, losing patience with her.

  Margery cut in with, ‘Joeyou never made this yourself, did you?

  And Jessica was about to say something when a dog started barking out in the garden again; only it wasn’t barking this time so much as howling.

  ‘Mumcan I have another piece? Mum?’

  There was a pause in the air.

  Ignoring Arthur, Jessica stood up suddenly. Crossing the kitchen, she opened the back door. Outside it was still raining, and the sky was orange-grey and full of storm.

  The next minute Joe was beside her. ‘Jess?’

  ‘There’s a dog out therein all that rain.’

  ‘Maybe one of the neighbour’s,’ Joe said without looking, putting his arm around her and trying to guide her back into the kitchen. ‘Come on.’

  She carried on staring out into the garden, thinking she saw movement under the pine trees. The yelping carried on. There was definitely a dog at the end of the garden.

  Behind them, in the kitchen, Arthur and Findlay started singing, ‘Who let the dogs outwhowhowho? Who let the dogs out?’

  ‘It’s getting wet,’ Jessica said, ‘I think it wants to come in.’

  ‘Here,’ Lenny said, pushing a plate of cake in her hand, suddenly standing as close to her as Joe was, flanking her. ‘Hope I didn’t cut it too big.’

  Jessica stared at the cake then up at Lenny, who was staring at Joe.

  ‘I think we should go now,’ she said.

  Chapter 32

  ‘You’re tired,’ Ellie said, slowly packing her books away.

  ‘Yeah,’ Robert agreed, peering into his bag, which was open on the desk in front of him.

  The lights in the classroom were on because of the rain clouds that had been gathering all afternoon and were now breaking dismally against the windows. The lighting throughout the school was a great equalisereverything looked ugly under it.