The Hopes and Dreams of Lucy Baker

by Jenni Keer

  ‘Yes.’

  Something equally warm flooded Lucy’s heart; she trusted the judgement of that old, worn-out chair. She looked across at George and was glad she was persevering with the spells. They looked at each other, neither of them able to tear their eyes away, but neither of them able to think of a single thing to say.

  The clocks took over the conversation they were unable to have as the living-room door opened. Brenda, with an extra bun on a pretty tea plate, looked at the faces of her two young neighbours and grinned. She handed the plate to Lucy and joined her on the sofa.

  ‘So, who’s been trying to ease their guilty conscience by playing fairy godmother then?’ Lucy asked to break the silence.

  George looked confused.

  ‘Replacing Chloe’s rabbit.’

  ‘Ah, that. Well, Scratbag is my responsibility, so I felt accountable for his actions. It was the least I could do.’

  ‘Chloe’s mum said you chose the name?’ She bit her lip to stop herself smiling.

  ‘I blurted out something that sounded about right. What do I know about naming a rabbit?’

  The atmosphere was strained and Lucy couldn’t pinpoint why. George clearly felt the same as he searched for a conversational topic. ‘You look, erm…different.’ George looked at Lucy properly now that he’d drained his cup. ‘Very professional. You’ll be getting highlights, lowlights, manicures and leg waxes next. And fake tans.’ The last comment was made with a sigh.

  ‘Stop trying to change the subject. You are in trouble, Mr Aberdour. Wait until you’re a parent. I’ll turn up with a drum kit for your son’s third birthday. A big one.’

  Not quite understanding the conversation going on, Brenda looked between the pair of them like a Centre Court spectator.

  ‘Our magnanimous neighbour has been buying presents for little girls to ease his guilty conscience,’ Lucy explained.

  ‘That sounds wrong,’ George huffed.

  ‘And now, in further efforts to ingratiate himself to the Renborough community, I find him wooing the most eligible lady in the street.’

  ‘Oh, he quite often pops in now, don’t you, dear? I suspect it’s my sexual allure.’ George choked on his freshly poured cup of tea and the tips of his ears went beetroot red. ‘Like so many men, he is drawn to my raw animal magnetism.’ Brenda tossed back her head and gave a George a cheeky wink. He dropped his eyes and studied the laces on his brown brogues.

  It was news to Lucy that George had been visiting Brenda other than the two weekends she’d asked him to keep an eye on her, but it was nice to know he was being a good neighbour. She might even have to look for a bigger house point chart for him.

  ‘Now, to this hand.’ Brenda reached out for George’s hand and took it in her own. Lucy noticed for the first time that he had a square beige plaster across the back of it. She watched Brenda peel it back gently to reveal a nasty cut underneath. ‘It’s not infected, just deep. A dab of TCP should do the trick.’

  ‘TCP?’ Lucy said. ‘Not chamomile and honey smeared on a calendula leaf? Or a potato poultice?’

  ‘So you have been paying attention. Perhaps I should have trained you up, but too late now. Most of the herbs and spices have gone, Lucy. I was serious when I said I was getting too old for this healing lark. Anyway, TCP has been around for a hundred years.’

  ‘But it’s not a natural remedy. It’s a man-made product.’

  ‘Fetch an aloe vera leaf then,’ Brenda sighed. ‘There should be a pot on the kitchen windowsill. But I’ve told you: I’m winding all this down. I don’t want the responsibility. You’ll have to do it, Lucy.’

  Fetching the plant from the kitchen, Lucy could see Brenda had cleared out an awful lot. Shelves held empty bottles, there were spaces where the large jars and tins had been, and the rows of various drying herbs were noticeable by their absence. It didn’t smell the same either; whereas before your nostrils were greeted by repeated wafts of fragrant herbs, sweet honey or fresh flower scents, now all Lucy could smell was the slightly meaty aroma of a cooked dinner. It wasn’t an unpleasant smell, but it wasn’t the exotic, comforting smell of the kitchen that she’d felt so at home in for the last two years.

  She carried the plant back to the living room, the chime above the door tinkling as she nudged it open with her bottom, and snapped off one of the fleshy, green leaves. Kneeling in front of George, conscious of his proximity, she reached out for his mighty hand. Why she should feel so intimidated all of a sudden was bemusing, but she was acutely aware of both the warmth of his fingers as they lay across hers and his intense stare. As she dabbed the broken end of the aloe vera onto the wound, she asked how he’d managed to injure himself.

  ‘Don’t ask,’ came the familiar blunt reply.

  So she didn’t.

  Jess was away from the office at the start of the week, training on the new accounting software, but as they only saw each other for occasional coinciding tea and coffee runs, Lucy didn’t miss her as much as she thought she would. The company was rushed off its feet with summer orders, and she enjoyed the grumpy banter of the warehouse crowd at lunchtime.

  Sam let it be known that staff changes were afoot, but so far this had only involved swapping two guys around in the warehouse, as she felt their skills would be better suited to each other’s jobs. She had been proved right and both were happy with the move.

  Sam was filing papers in the corner near Pat and Lucy’s desks, when she came across an old newspaper article from the late Eighties. It covered the launch of the company and in the grainy photograph, she could make out Vernon and Richard Tompkins. They were the only two original members of staff, although the total staff had been ten back then, and was nearer forty now.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be great to come up with something newsworthy to get us back in the paper?’ Sam said. ‘I skimmed through a copy of the Renborough Chronicle at the surgery the other day and the most exciting story they were running was about a local man who’s scooped some national prize with his Polish Frizzle. They are crying out for news, so perhaps we should give them some, even if it’s just an office sponsored walk for charity.’

  Lucy immediately thought of the nativity scene she’d discussed with Adam. Han Solo and Princess Leia would make a good Joseph and Mary, and R2-D2 might be fun for the baby, as anything with Star Wars on had been selling well for the last fifteen years. Although it seemed ridiculous to be thinking about Christmas in June, Adam was right to plan ahead. To knit that many figures would take several weeks, and the toy industry, like most of the retail world, would be gearing up for Christmas by the end of August.

  ‘News? I can give them news,’ said Adam, who as usual had wandered over to involve himself in whatever was going on without him. ‘How about organising a topless calendar, Calendar Girls style? Although Pat would need an enormous—’

  ‘Adam, my office. Now,’ said Sam, putting the newspaper cutting back in the file and tucking it under her arm.

  There was a hushed silence as the sales staff watched Adam trail behind Sam. No one spoke for a moment. The door to Sam’s office swung shut.

  ‘I hope he doesn’t get in massive trouble,’ said Sonjit. ‘I kind of like him, despite everything.’ There were general mumbles of agreement.

  ‘The problem is, he doesn’t realise when he’s overstepped the line,’ said Connor. ‘It’s like this big act to make us like him and to be one of us, but he’s our boss. Does he need us to like him?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Lucy, and she thought about the short trousers and the mysterious home life. ‘But what he fails to grasp is we’d like him a whole lot more if he stopped trying so hard.’

  ‘He was wonderful last year when Mum was at the hospice,’ said Sonjit, ‘and he’s always so understanding when people have to leave work early for sick kids, that sometimes I think he must have a family, or perhaps even a wife.’ She sighed and looked briefly across at Adam.

  Lucy realised they knew very little about him. He was often in a rush to
get home, and occasionally said “we” when referring to things he’d done outside work, but he never mentioned anyone specific.

  Adam and Sam stood facing each other behind the full-length glass of her office window as the sales team tried to watch without making it obvious that’s what they were doing. Sam had her hands on her hips and Adam, who started the conversation with a nonchalant shrug and head high, left her office five minutes later looking at his shoes before slumping into his chair.

  Lucy’s internal line buzzed.

  ‘There’s no way he’s married,’ whispered Pat. ‘A wife would never let him leave the house in those trousers.’

  Chapter 37

  All afternoon, Lucy played with ideas for the knitted nativity, conscious of Sam’s plan to get the company into the local paper. The more she thought it, the more she was convinced it could work. If she made the figures on the same scale as her knitted celebrities, perhaps she could even use a couple of them. The three bears could bring traditional toys as gifts: a drum, a toy car, and perhaps a small toy soldier. All easy enough to knit. The seating could be temporarily removed from reception, the scene could be set up there, and the figures could be auctioned off after Christmas for charity. If the local papers picked it up, it would be great publicity.

  As she left the building later that afternoon and stepped out into the bright sunshine, a large black Audi swept into the car park. Lucy paused. What was he doing at Tompkins? She couldn’t even remember telling him where she worked. The locket was clearly more powerful than she realised.

  Conscious of her appearance, she smoothed her hair and adjusted her top. Lingering by the door, she waited while he parked, locked the vehicle and walked over to her.

  ‘George, what a lovely surprise.’ She felt slightly breathless all of a sudden. She kept forgetting how big and powerful he was until she stood near him. That damn aftershave wasn’t helping. Her legs wobbled.

  ‘Ah, Lucy. Now I understand. I really wish you hadn’t interfered.’ He looked irritated and cross. And then he walked straight past her and into the company building, leaving Lucy totally bemused.

  Passing Brenda’s gate on the way home, Lucy noticed her friend’s silhouette moving behind the glass of the front door, so she walked up the path and knocked. She could do with offloading about George’s strange behaviour that afternoon.

  ‘Glad you called by.’ Brenda gave her a big smile as she opened the door. ‘Haven’t seen you for a couple of days and I wondered how you were doing.’ Lucy felt a tiny stab in her heart. She’d been with Brenda that morning, as she was every morning. ‘I’ve been a busy bunny today and have some exciting news. Come in and let me tell you all about it. In fact, would you like to stay for supper? I walked into town and got a huge piece of haddock – far too much for one. We can share it.’

  ‘That would be lovely. Just let me dump my bags and change out of this suit. Give me five minutes.’

  ‘I’ll be up on the third floor, but I’ll leave the door on the latch. I’ve been in Jim’s studio this afternoon, reconnecting with him. I only popped downstairs briefly to answer the phone. Wish I hadn’t bothered. Stupid PPI.’

  Reconnecting? Not a séance or a Ouija board, Lucy hoped.

  Ten minutes later, she stood in Brenda’s hallway and heard the boom of a bass drum, a flurry of lighter beats and a tinkling cymbal drift down from the top of the house.

  Like a child from Hamelin blindly following the music of the piper, Lucy climbed the first flight of stairs and the drumming got louder. She paused on the middle landing, where the bookshelves housed a combination of books about herbal remedies and Seventies Mills and Boons. A turquoise and green glass bauble hung in the landing window, casting a beautiful rainbow on the pale wall opposite.

  Boom-boom, tish. Boom-boom, tish. The drums were working up to a dramatic crescendo as she reached the top floor and rounded the corner. There was only one door on this storey. The partition walls had been taken down and the whole floor turned into one relatively soundproofed home studio, except when the door was left open like today. It was the room Brenda always escaped to when she was missing Jim and, although it wasn’t the first time Lucy had been up there, it was the first time she had heard Brenda play. As she entered, she saw her friend sitting behind the drums, her wavy purple-streaked hair flying about her shoulders as her head bobbed about in time to the beat. Her eyes were closed as she lost herself in an imaginary world.

  Boom, tish, boom, tish, BOOM.

  Brenda finished with a flurry of arms and swishing hair, and finally opened her eyes.

  ‘Have a seat, my dear,’ and she indicated to a battered leather armchair next to the drum kit. ‘I used to sit there when Jim was playing. Sometimes he’d have some of the guys up here with him. It was called jamming back then, but I expect that’s an old-fashioned term nowadays. Often he’d sit up here alone with headphones on, accompanying an old track. He’d just bash away, the same beats, over and over.’

  ‘I didn’t know you could play.’

  ‘I only tinker with the snare drum, high hats and bass, but you don’t live with a drummer for forty years and not pick up a few things. I can’t really play. It’s just waving some sticks around, but it’s a great stress reliever.’ She laid the drumsticks carefully across the snare drum. ‘He loved this set: Ludwig Mod Orange, but the colour has faded a bit. It was his favourite. End of the Sixties. I think his very first drum kit is still here somewhere, boxed up.’ This was all information Lucy had heard before but she smiled and looked interested.

  The black and white photo on the wall of Brenda and Jim caught her eye. It was taken in the late Sixties after one of the Yellow Crows’ sell-out concerts. Brenda looked so young and so alive. She was in a bold print tunic top and flared jeans, with her long dark hair framing her face and fake lashes that almost met her eyebrows. In a way, she hadn’t changed. She was just as vibrant at seventy-nine, and not just because of the wild hair. Jim, with his equally mad hair, was gazing at the petite girl by his side, not at all bothered by the all-seeing eye of the camera. It made Lucy feel warm inside to share this moment in time, even though it was fifty years on, with two people so clearly in love.

  ‘I miss him terribly, Lucy.’ Her voice cracked.

  ‘I know.’

  Brenda slid off the stool, came over to her friend, bent down and gave her the tightest hug. There were muffled sniffs and Lucy kissed the top of her head, returning the hug but even tighter.

  ‘He’s worried about me, you know. He knows what’s going on and has been telling me for months things weren’t right, but I was too stubborn to listen. I can feel him, more so up here, but he is always with me.’

  Not quite sure where she stood on matters of the afterlife, Lucy was always in awe of the incredible connection Jim and Brenda had. Was it possible to believe it went beyond the grave? Theirs was a once in a lifetime love, for all its freedoms and non-conformity. Whether Jim was still a presence somewhere in the ether or an overwhelming strong memory that Brenda couldn’t let go of in her own head was completely irrelevant.

  Later, they sat together at the kitchen table. Lucy had prepared the dinner as Brenda seemed to have retreated to a distant world, possibly one where she could be with Jim. Pushing the mashed potato around her plate and not eating properly, Lucy gently reminded Brenda to put the food in her mouth. There were long silences when the kitchen clock was the only sound, but now the room was devoid of its familiar aromas, the clock was a comfort.

  ‘You had some news for me?’ Lucy said, trying to reconnect.

  ‘Did I?’ Brenda stared at the fork in her hand as though she couldn’t work out how it got there, and then she scooped up a piece of the white fish and put in in her mouth. ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘So…’ Lucy prompted.

  ‘So, you know I turn eighty in a couple of weeks? Well, I’ve decided to have a birthday party after all. It was talk of that great big bash your mother is having that started me thinking.’

 
Lucy had asked her friend what she wanted to do for her birthday a few months ago but Brenda had only wanted a quiet get-together, which Lucy had planned to organise on her behalf nearer the time.

  ‘A little tea party or a bigger function?’ Although Lucy was no longer as petrified by the thought of a big affair as she had been the previous month.

  ‘The biggest I can afford. I’m hiring that company on the high street – Party People, I think they’re called. They did that elaborate wedding for Marjorie’s granddaughter last year. I may not have many close friends, but I do know a lot of people. I’d like to do something to mark what is, after all, a fairly impressive landmark. I may not still be here to celebrate ninety… Or be with it enough to know what’s going on.’

  Lucy couldn’t bring herself to contradict Brenda’s last statement so chose not to comment.

  ‘Money isn’t an issue and I don’t want the stress of trying to do it myself. The nice young lady from the shop is coming to finalise everything next week. All I have to do is say what I want and they will make my wishes come true.’ She tapped her fork in the air as if it was the magic wand of a fairy godmother.

  ‘What a wonderful idea,’ said Lucy. ‘But let me help. It’s not right you should be doing this by yourself.’

  ‘My dear, this is exactly why I kept it to myself until now. It’s a gift to all my friends. Marjorie was faffing around and offering to make a cake, a lovely thought, but she’s not in great health at the moment and it’s what I’m paying Party People for. They take the worry out of it all.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘You should know by now there is no point in arguing with me when my mind’s made up.’ She threw Lucy a surreptitious glance as she scooped up the last of her mashed potato. ‘That hunky George will be there. I’ve already asked him to keep the date free…’

  Lucy felt her pulse quicken and reached into her jeans pocket to feel for the linen square. The spell said to take it everywhere. She absent-mindedly caressed the edge of the fabric. What exactly were her feelings for George? One minute she felt an undeniable attraction, the next, he made her so cross she wanted to stamp on his head. Even Jeremy Vine and his swingometer couldn’t keep up. But all of that was unimportant because it clearly mattered so much to Brenda.