A Perfect Devon Farmhouse

One

On a Monday evening, in a compact flat in South London, a tall woman lay sprawled on the sofa, her laptop angled against a cushion. Her short straw-coloured hair was slightly straggly, as if a trip to the hairdresser was imminent. The sash windows were open, letting in a warm June breeze along with the smell of a neighbour’s late-night barbeque. Someone had burned the sausages.

She reached down for her own meal and forked in a mouthful of tandoori paneer tikka masala. Indian was her favourite cuisine. It had also been Guy’s.

Glancing up from her screen she noticed the pulsing glow of light from cars, streetlamps and houses long since converted into flats. It was never dark in London, not like the deep darkness of her rural Devon childhood, where torches always hung in readiness from hooks on the pine kitchen dresser.

Her phone pinged. She glanced at the screen and chuckled. Someone had posted on the Brambleton Gals WhatsApp group. It was Rianna. Most people knew her as ‘Anna’, but she used her full name for her work as an architect, believing it conjured a ring of glamour.

Can’t believe you’re off on Sunday! If it rains here for one more day, I’m coming with you!

Clare let out a long, deep sigh. After five long years without Guy, she was used to travelling solo, but it still hurt. Seconds later, the screen lit up with a string of emojis from the third group member, Trish. There was a picture of an umbrella, clouds, and then a monkey hiding his face behind his hands. Clare responded.

Five days to go! I’ll send some sunshine your way. xxx

She dropped the phone and returned to her curry. She missed her friends, but she could never understand why Trish and Anna had wanted to stay in Brambleton instead of escaping Devon the minute they were old enough, as Clare had. She pictured her childhood home, Orchard Farm, a pretty farmhouse nestled among rolling meadows where Jersey cows roamed, munching contentedly on lush grass. She remembered her father holding her up in his arms so she could stroke the ears of a milker. Like Guy, he too had died in an accident before his time. Clare had been eleven when she lost the first man she loved, and nearly forty when she lost the second. She would never love another.

She pushed the memories away, as her mother had taught her to do after her father died, diverting her mind by choosing a few emojis to reply to Trish and Anna. Neither had come to London recently and Clare hadn’t been back to Devon in seven years, not since that row with her mother. What her mother had said then was wrong, and she had compounded that sin under the guise of a condolence letter when Guy died. But time had eroded the spiky edges of Clare’s anger, and she was beginning to think she might be ready to patch things up. She would add ‘ ring Mum ’ to her task list, and if there was time, she might even visit her before she flew to Spain on Sunday.

Clare pulled up a file marked Sabbatical . For the last five years she had been too wrapped up in her work to contemplate planning a holiday.

But in January the senior partner had urged Clare to take a year off, sweetening the suggestion by offering to pay 50 per cent of her salary. Carefully planned to eke out her savings, the adventure would start in Spain and take her across Europe before heading east, culminating in a two-month journey through India.

A bus screeched to a halt outside pulling Clare from her daydream. She finished her curry, then composed a letter, her fingers dancing across the keyboard, loving the reassuring clickity-click sound of the keys; she felt like a medieval champion on a white horse, galloping to rescue a distressed damsel. Clients didn’t understand the protections provided by employment law, but they didn’t have to. Clare and her colleagues did. And Clare relished taking on powerful employers on behalf of the underdogs.

Clare saved her work, then picked up her to do list, crossing off ‘ finish letter for Jenkins case ’. She ran her eyes down her tasks:

· Hand over work notes

· Finish packing

· Clear bedrooms to storage

· Find white goods manuals

· Spare keys

· Clear out fridge

Her mortgage company prohibited renting, so at the end of June two trainee solicitors were moving in as ‘flat sitters’ and would reimburse Clare for the utility bills.

She tossed the list aside, collected the used takeaway containers and in three strides was in her tiny galley kitchen. She flicked on the kettle, and as she caught sight of her suitcases by the front door, a shiver of excitement shot through her. Her year-long adventure would take her to continents she’d never visited. When she was younger, she couldn’t afford long-haul jaunts, and then she’d met Guy and there were more important claims on her holiday time. He had been a rally driver, and while her colleagues had lazed in pampered luxury in far-flung destinations, Clare had spent her holidays at racetracks, listening to the high-pitched whine of finely tuned engines, frantically searching for Guy’s number on the bonnets of cars hurtling towards her. This adventure would take her to all those places she might have visited if she hadn’t been his most loyal fan.

Clare pulled open the fridge, revealing the breakfast she had purchased on her way home from the office – a single yoghurt beside a punnet of strawberries – and a small container of milk, which made her think about her mother’s dairy herd. Cindy’s passion was her orchard, but the farm’s income came from milk. She imagined her mother jogging across the farmyard, a black Labrador lolloping in her wake. The dog’s name would be Jet; their family’s labs were always black, and always called Jet. In her mind’s eye, her mother had a spanner in one hand and a hammer in the other. Farming was a life of fixing things: fences, equipment, old vehicles. After her father died, her mother had mastered those skills and tried to teach her daughter too, but tools didn’t sit naturally in Clare’s hands. She shuddered at the memory of her mother showing her how to change a tyre. Clare liked instruments she could master, like law books.

What her mother did teach her though was how to recover from life’s upsets, no matter how traumatic, by keeping busy. Living that mantra helped both women after Clare’s father died in a farming accident, ensuring task lists were always long and never allowed space to dwell in the past. After he was buried, mother and daughter never discussed him again. Clare sighed. Her mother was good at compartmentalizing. Would she welcome a phone call from Clare? She wondered if her mother was ready to heal their rift. After seven years, how would she react to her daughter getting in touch properly, not just the stiff ‘seasonal greetings’ cards they exchanged at Christmas? Maybe Clare shouldn’t rush things. After all, she had her hands full with her sabbatical on the horizon.

The kettle clicked off and Clare’s hand hovered over the milk, then switched to a bottle of wine. There was just enough left for two glasses, and, with a pang of longing, she thought of the many times she used to come home from work and pour a glass for her and Guy. He preferred beer but was forgetful about restocking the fridge; she smiled, he was forgetful full stop, always fetching himself a beer or a sandwich without bringing anything for her.

Her phone rang. She glanced at the kitchen clock – ten past nine. Odd. She ran to answer, seeing the screen flashing on the sitting room table. It wasn’t anyone in her contacts list. It was too late for a cold call, probably a wrong number. She answered warily.

‘Hello?’

‘Clare?’

She struggled to place the voice. It was a woman, vaguely familiar. Was it a former client? It wasn’t too late for a business call. ‘Speaking,’ she said in a formal tone.

‘Clare, are you alone?’

She clutched at the phone, her stomach churning, but the voice was gentle, caring. ‘Who is this, please?’

‘It’s Ivy.’

‘Ivy!’ Mentally, she visualized her mother’s best friend. Ivy was short, famed for being precisely the height of a badminton net: 5 ft 1 in. And if asked for a word to describe the recently retired vicar, Clare would have chosen ‘rotund’. She was stocky, with a round open face, and frequently wore billowing, tent-like dresses which accentuated her girth. Why was Ivy calling at this hour?

‘Clare, I’ve got some bad news. This is going to come as a terrible shock. I’m so sorry, there’s no gentle way of saying this, but your mother died earlier this evening.’

‘What?’ Clare slumped on the sofa.

Ivy spoke slowly, gently as if to a child. ‘Cindy died before the paramedics arrived. I’m so very sorry. Is there someone I can call to be with you? A friend?’

Clare went completely still. Her mind was blank. She dredged around it for anyone in London she could call on. She had workmates she occasionally met for drinks on a Friday night, but no one to share such intimate news with. After Guy had died in a horrific crash at a rally, she’d lost touch with their social circle. They were his friends really and, like him, petrol heads. She didn’t blame them for his death, but they were a constant reminder of the sport which killed him.

‘Clare, are you still there? Take your time. I’m here. I won’t hang up. Before Cindy died, we said the Lord’s Prayer together ...’

Clare suspected the prayer was more of a solace to Ivy than Cindy; her mother worshipped the orchard, not God. Clare tried to focus on what Ivy had told her. Her mother was dead. That couldn’t be right. Ivy must be mistaken. Mentally she envisioned her mother manhandling cows from the milking parlour into a meadow, dressed in her trademark blue overalls, splattered with stains, the once-dark colour long since faded from repeated boil washes. Clare could see the rolling hills, the gentle swaying of the cows, hear their clomping hooves and soft snorts as her mother chivvied them through the gate. How could such an active woman die so suddenly aged seventy-four? She closed her eyes in an attempt to block out the memory, feeling the soft pricking of tears on her eyelids. Ivy’s soft voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘You need to come home. Is there someone who can be with you tonight, then you can catch a train in the morning?’

‘No.’ she croaked.

‘Right,’ said Ivy forcefully. ‘There’s a late train from Paddington at ten o’clock. I’ll meet you at Tiverton Parkway.’

Clare swallowed the lump in her throat, but her face crumpled, and she bit hard on her lip to stop the tears. Her mother was dead. They hadn’t spoken for the past seven years, but still Clare felt an empty numbness descend like a dark Devon night.

Clare realized Ivy was saying something else. ‘She asked me to give you a message. Hang on ... I wrote it down.’

Had her mother told Ivy she regretted their estrangement? If Cindy had confided in anyone, it would have been Ivy. Clare spoke in a breathless rush. ‘What did she say?’

The line fell silent, then Clare heard a rustle of paper being unfurled, a gravelly cough and finally Ivy’s voice. ‘She said, “ Tell Clare, I’m sorry. She’s a smart girl. She’ll sort this out .”’