‘Oh, so you’re not happy about having us back then?’ I felt the tears that had been threatening all evening start once more. Rejected now by my own mother as well as that bastard Dominic.
‘Oh dear, something has happened, hasn’t it?’ Mum set off at speed once the lights turned to her advantage, totally oblivious of the woman in the Evoque to her left, mouthing some obscenity as Mum cut her up. ‘So, Dominic? I assume he’s got another woman – or even another man, what with all this gender fluidity – and as he’s your boss that means you’re out of a job as well?’
‘He’s married, Mum.’
‘Doesn’t surprise me, darling.’ Mum gave my arm a little squeeze of sympathy.
‘I thought you liked him?’ I turned and stared at her.
‘We only met him once, Charlie,’ Mum protested. ‘And yes, Dad and I both liked him enormously… but…’
‘But? But what?’ Even though Dominic was a cheating bastard, I still wanted my mother’s approval of him.
‘Oh, maybe he was just too good-looking, too worldly-wise. To get to almost forty and not have a wife somewhere tucked away… And you did say he was away an awful lot. You were supposed to be sharing that flat with him, but you spent a hell of a lot of the time on your own.’
‘I really like being on my own,’ I protested crossly, stung by her words.
‘I’m not saying you don’t. But every time I rang you, Dominic appeared to be away in the States, or Paris…’
‘Or Haslemere. God, I don’t even know where Haslemere is.’
Mum frowned. ‘I’m not sure I do either. Can’t be that great a place if we’ve never heard of it. Anyway, you’re home now, darling.’
We continued in silence through Westenbury, the village on the outskirts of Midhope where I’d lived all my life until leaving for university and then London. Slowing down and indicating right, Mum pulled into the drive of our Victorian detached house. It seemed smaller somehow, not quite as I remembered it. But then, I guess, being away for some time does that to you.
‘And it’s lovely to have you, you know that,’ Mum said, patting my arm. ‘Come on, Dad and Daisy are waiting for us.’
I opened the car door and stretched, yawning. I felt grubby, hungover and thoroughly depressed. If, when I’d galloped off down the road to the tube that morning, slice of toast and Marmite in one hand, trusty Tardis in the other, someone had told me that, fifteen hours later, I’d be back with my mum and dad in Westenbury village with no job and no flat, I’d have laughed at their idiocy.
‘It won’t be for long, Mum.’ I said, feeling slightly panicky at being back at the starting line once again. ‘A couple of days, a week at the most to sort myself a new job and somewhere to live in London, and I’ll be off back down again.’
*
‘So, what happened to your career as waitress in the sky?’ I hugged my younger sister before flopping down onto her bed and, closing my eyes, tried to shut out the awful events of the day.
‘Cunnilingus finished me off.’
‘Sorry?’ I opened one eye and squinted at Daisy. ‘I can’t take you seriously with that purple stuff on your hair and white stuff above your lips.’
‘I’ve no money to get my hair done at the hairdresser so I’m touching up the roots myself – I borrowed Vivienne’s toothbrush to do the job: she’s the only one without an electric one round here – and for some reason I seem to be sprouting a moustache suddenly, so I’m bleaching that as well. I blame all the fumes I’ve had to breathe in while walking up and down that damned cabin.’
I looked at Daisy doubtfully. ‘Fumes give you a moustache? Never heard that one before. You’re just getting old. By the time you’re thirty you’ll probably have a beard that’ll give Rip Van Winkle a run for his money.’
‘Shit, do you think so?’ Daisy felt her chin before scrutinising her face in the mirror. ‘My eyebrows are sprouting as well. Raphael said to me the other week, “Eets like being in bed wiz Denees Healey.”’
I tutted. ‘Cheeky sod. You should have asked the little frog how he knew what being in bed wiz Denees Healey was like.’
We both cackled at that and I felt a bit better that Daisy was having a few problems on the man front too. No matter how much you might adore your sister, you don’t want her to be one up on you, especially when she’s two years younger than you.
‘You do know you can’t call the French Frogs any more,’ Daisy tutted in turn. ‘I thought you’d have learned that, living in London. Totally and utterly not PC. Anyway, the little frog’s on the way out, I reckon, especially as I’ll no longer be meeting up with him at Charles De Gaulle: Terminal 2D. He’ll have to concentrate on handling baggage rather than me in future.’ Daisy lay down on the bed beside me, shoving me up towards the wall as she did so. ‘Blimey, it’s jolly hard work keeping your face tilted upwards so this vile-smelling stuff doesn’t slide down into your mouth.’
‘And the cunnilingus?’ I closed my eyes again and snuggled under Daisy’s duvet. It felt warm and safe and I wanted to hide there for ever, shutting out the events of the past few hours.
Daisy laughed. ‘It was so boring up there in the sky that, once we’d served the drinks, food, duty free and slapped down the wandering drunks and gropers, we’d come up with ways to entertain ourselves.’
‘Couldn’t you just strap yourself in and have a snooze?’
Daisy tutted. ‘Having a kip thirty-five thousand feet up is hardly professional.’
‘And indulging in a mile-high sex act is? So, you entertained yourselves with a bit of covert oral sex? With whom? Not the pilot, I hope?’
Daisy laughed. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Have you seen the size of a cockpit on a charter plane to Malaga?’
‘It wasn’t the cock pit I was imagining.’ I opened one eye and raised its eyebrow in her direction.
Daisy laughed again. ‘If living in London has given you such a vivid imagination, it’s probably time you came back north. Anyway, in order to overcome the total monotony of trailing up and down the aisle, we set ourselves little tasks. The task for the day was for a crew member to get the word cunnilingus into a sentence over the public-address system.’
‘Right.’ I yawned. It all sounded terribly juvenile. ‘As in, please be aware that cunnilingus, like smoking, is not permitted in the aircraft toilet?’
‘Do you want to hear how clever I was, or not?’
‘Sorry, go on.’
‘So, over the speaker I said, “Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. The seat belt sign is still illuminated so please ensure you’re strapped in. There does appear to be some turbulence, which may give a bit of a bumpy ride. It could be there for a while as it appears to be the sort that kinda lingers…’
I laughed despite myself. ‘Oh, well done. Ten out of ten.’
‘Yes, I was so pleased with my quick wit. Unfortunately, while most of the crew thought it was brilliant, one of the stewards, who was teed off with me because the co-pilot he’d fancied for ages had chatted me up in Liverpool, reported me to my line manager.’
‘The traitor. And you were in trouble?’
‘Sacked,’ Daisy sniffed, jumping off the bed and examining her now quite purple roots in the mirror. ‘I don’t really care, because the season was coming to an end and I’d totally had enough of the whole damned circus of arm waving the safety stuff when nobody takes any notice because they know it’s all a farce anyway, and a mask and yellow rubber dinghy and abandoning high heels isn’t going to save them from the sharks below.’
‘Sharks? In Malaga?’
‘You know what I mean.’
I yawned. God, I was tired. And depressed. ‘So, what now? You can’t stay here for ever.’
‘I don’t plan to.’ Daisy checked her watch before wiping the white cream off her top lip with a couple of quick moves before squinting in the mirror above her dressing table once more. ‘There, that’s better. Ready to face the world now.’
‘I don’t imagine there’s m
uch of the world to face round here. There never was before, so I don’t see why there should be now.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Daisy frowned. ‘I’m actually enjoying being back. Having both feet on the ground all the time.’
‘Yes, but what are you going to do? You can’t just sit around all day doing nothing.’
‘Hey, I’ve not stopped since I came home three days ago. I’m already earning my keep by giving the garden a makeover. And Westenbury’s becoming quite trendy, you know. There’s Clementine’s restaurant down the road. I thought I might see if they need any kitchen or waiting staff. Just until I find some more landscaping work.’
‘Do people want their gardens doing in November? I thought it was a miserable time of year for gardens?’
‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ Daisy said enthusiastically, warming to her theme. ‘Dahlias need lifting, new bulbs need planting, the ground needs to be prepared for planting hedges, trees and shrubs…’
‘Fine, fine, enough,’ I groaned, burying my head under her pillow. ‘Spare me the details; I’ve got one hell of a headache. You won’t catch me staying round here longer than I have to. As soon as I’ve sorted myself a new job, I’ll be back in London. I sort of panicked. You know, there I was, on the streets of Bloomsbury, five bin bags around my feet and I just headed for King’s Cross and the train home. I should have gone to stay with someone in London really, but to be honest I was too embarrassed to ring anyone.’
‘Embarrassed?’ Why? Because that wanker was married all along?’
‘No, not because of that,’ I managed to articulate from the muffled depths of the pillow before surfacing fully and sitting up. ‘I suppose I’ve not been the best friend since moving in with Dominic. I was just so happy to come home and be with him – when he actually was at the flat – that I’d not really wanted to socialise with friends.’
‘That’s really poor of you, Charlie.’ Daisy sounded cross. ‘You really shouldn’t give up your friends just because you’ve moved in with some man.’
‘Anyway,’ I went on, not really listening, ‘when Dominic finds out I’ve left London, he might realise just what he’s missing and…’
‘Oh, don’t be so wet, Charlie. He’s had you over, good and proper. And yes,’ Daisy went on, ‘I totally understand what you saw in him and that you were taken in by him. He was charming and pretty gorgeous to boot.’
‘Oh, he was, he was.’ I lashed out furiously at the pillow.
‘But you’re better off up here for a while,’ Daisy affected a broad Yorkshire accent. ‘Oop North wi yer mam and dad, yer gran and yer little sister.’
3
‘God, Dad, it’s bloody freezing in here.’ I felt the radiator underneath the kitchen window; it was stone cold. ‘Can’t we have some heat on?’
‘Heat? What’s the matter with you?’ Dad grinned as he unclipped Malvolio, his black Lab from his leash, wet and smelling highly of dog after his morning walk across Norman’s Meadow – a local beauty spot – and the woods beyond. ‘Pass me that towel, Charlie, would you? Heat?’ he repeated. ‘It’s not winter yet. Go and put another sweater on.’
‘Since when has the middle of November not been winter?’ I said crossly. ‘It’s like the sodding Arctic in here.’ I scraped the remains from a jar of Marmite and smeared it onto a slice of toast. ‘And we need more Marmite.’
‘Darling girl, there are lots of things we need in this world but are very unlikely to get. Such is life.’ I was enveloped in a flurry of trailing silk scarves, a plethora of cold metallic bangles and the overpowering, almost nauseating smell of Givenchy, all of which had defined my granny Maddison – or Vivienne, as she insisted on being called – for as long as I could remember.
‘Hi, Vivienne, how come you’re camping out here too? What’s wrong with your place?’
‘Decorators, darling. I’ve just had to have them in and I cannot cope with their endless mugs of Builders’ Bum tea and their constant need for Radio One that sets my nerves on edge. But it’s the terrible fumes from the paint that play absolute havoc with one’s sinuses and complexion. Your father very kindly suggested I come and stay here for the duration.’
‘Did I? Are you sure about that?’ Dad winked at me.
‘And now we’re all here. How simply marvellous. We shall have such a good Christmas.’
Christmas? I hadn’t intended still being back in the north for Christmas. It suddenly occurred to me why, only a couple of days ago, Dominic had said he would have to spend most of Christmas with his elderly parents. They were terribly possessive of him, he’d said, and he would have to go alone to stay with them in his family home in Cornwall. When I’d protested, said I was already planning Christmas for just the two of us in the apartment, he’d taken me in his arms and said there was absolutely nothing he could do about it, that he would give anything to be just with me but that surely my family would want me back in Yorkshire with them anyway? Dominic had stopped my protestations with his mouth, kissing me softly and then with some urgency until any thoughts of turkeys and tinsel were obliterated.
What a loser. And that was me, not him.
Seeing that I was near to tears, Vivienne stroked my hair, pulling loose strands back into my blonde plait.
‘By all the vows that ever men have broke, In number, more than ever women spoke. I was Hermia once, darling,’ she trilled, pouring muesli into her bowl and then immediately abandoning it as she warmed to her theme. ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Morecambe…’ – she pronounced it Morry Cambie – ‘… 1962, I believe it was, just before I met your grandfather.’ She paused dramatically, flinging a long scarlet scarf over one shoulder, catching Malvolio’s nose with one of its metallic embellishments. ‘Men will always deceive women.’
Vivienne had been quite famous in her day. Against her parents’ wishes, she’d applied for and won a place at LAMDA in London before touring in rep up and down the country in the early sixties. Her big break had come when the BBC, desperate to come up with something to rival Coronation Street, had launched Emergency! and given the part of the sexy little blonde nurse, with whom all the doctors and patients were in love, to Vivienne McMaster, my gran.
‘Mum told you, did she?’ I was embarrassed and looked away, concentrating on chewing my toast, which appeared to have turned to ashes in my mouth. I poured tea from the giant brown teapot of my childhood and drank the stewed dark liquid gratefully.
‘Well, of course, darling. Why wouldn’t she? I’d have come and talked to you last night but I’d been learning my lines all evening and must have fallen asleep, exhausted.’
‘Your lines? What are you doing now?’
‘A rather amateurish production of darling Oscar’s Earnest. I am, of course, Lady Bracknell.’
I smiled. ‘Where is it on? Westenbury village hall? I bet you’re the only one who’s been a professional actor, aren’t you?’
Vivienne sighed. ‘Of course, darling. There really is very little talent in this backwater. Now, your father is playing Jack Worthing and, I have to say, is quite marvellous in the role.’ She glanced over at Dad, who was examining Malvolio’s nose. ‘Your grandfather got it so wrong, not allowing your father to act. Such a terrible waste.’
‘I bet all the farmers round here don’t think it’s a waste when he’s out with them in the middle of the night pulling foals and calves out of their labouring mothers.’ Dad was a vet, very much in the manner of All Creatures Great and Small, and a pretty good one if the huge number of bottles of whisky and wine that came our way each Christmas from grateful farmers was anything to go by.
Vivienne nodded sadly. ‘Yes, I’m sure your father is a jolly good vet – look at him now with that dog of his – but he would have made a brilliant actor had he been allowed to follow in my footsteps rather than his father’s. He could have been a northern George Clooney with that chest hair and those eyebrows.’ She looked me up and down. ‘And you still haven’t any inclination…?’
‘
None whatsoever,’ I said firmly, shaking my head so she was in no doubt that I might ever abandon my career and start treading the boards. ‘I absolutely love what I’m doing in London. What I was doing.’
‘And this, this lothario of yours? Surely, darling, you must have had a tiny smidgen of an idea that he was married?’ Vivienne raised an eyebrow.
Had I? Part of me had perhaps wondered if he had another woman somewhere when he was always off, particularly at weekends, but I was so in love with him that I suppose I’d just buried my head and didn’t question him or the situation.
‘Vivienne, I promise you, I had absolutely no idea he was married. I don’t do married men.’
‘But, if you worked for him as well, surely the other people in the office would have known? Surely one has some inkling whether the boss is married or not?’
I shook my head. ‘I’m obviously one thick woman.’ I felt the tears start once more and swallowed them down. ‘Dominic said to keep it quiet at the office that we were an item. That the others wouldn’t like it that the new girl was living with the boss. So, I did.’
Vivienne tutted. ‘Oh, dearie, dearie me. And you fell for that one?’
‘Vivienne, stop it, leave her alone.’ Mum came into the kitchen and filled the kettle. ‘Charlie appears to have been had over good and proper. I can’t see it would have gone on for much longer, had his wife not got in there first.’
‘You didn’t suspect anything, did you, Mum? When you met him?’ I pleaded, not wanting to be the only one who’d been taken in.
Mum shook her head and I smiled gratefully at her. ‘No, Dad and I both thought he was charming. We had absolutely no reason to think he was married with – how many kids is it, Charlie?’ When I couldn’t reply, Mum went on, ‘If you want acting ability, Vivienne, there’s your man.’
I put my head on the breakfast table. ‘What am I going to do now?’ I wailed into the crumbs left behind from Dad’s toast and marmalade. They tasted sweet and buttery on my cheeks and lips as my tongue sought them out. ‘My life is over at the age of twenty-eight. I don’t have a job, a home or a man.’
Coming Home To Holly Close Farm Page 2