Chapter 2
2
Lakeside Inn – the venue for Mum’s birthday celebrations – was a hotel and restaurant in Willowdale, just a two-minute walk from my parents’ beloved home, Derwent Rise.
It was Mum’s actual birthday today – a Saturday – and, not being a fan of late nights, she’d decided on a lunchtime hot buffet, asking guests to arrive by noon with an anticipated 5p.m. finish. There were only a few spaces left in the car park when I pulled in at quarter to twelve. A cold blast of air made me gasp the moment I opened the car door. Shivering, I yanked it shut, wrapped my scarf round my neck and put my coat on.
As I crossed the car park, I could see into the large conservatory where we’d be eating. There were flowers on the tables and balloon bouquets dispersed around the room and I wondered whether I should have volunteered to arrive earlier to help set everything up, but Georgia hadn’t asked me to. I grimaced as it struck me that Georgia’s suggestion before Christmas that I stay at hers last night as well as tonight to give plenty of time to get organised had been her subtle way of asking for help. I was fifty-two years old. How had she not realised in over half a century shared on this planet that subtlety was completely lost on me? Hopefully she’d had some willing volunteers and hadn’t needed to do everything by herself.
Laughter and loud chatter hit me before I even opened the side door and nervous butterflies swooped in my stomach as I stepped into the foyer. Please let it go well. Georgia had told me that the guest list was a mix of relatives and friends. The former nearly all lived in Cumbria and the latter mainly in Willowdale, Pippinthwaite – the next village over where Georgia and Mark lived – or in the nearby market town of Keswick.
There were several hooks on the wall so I hung up my coat and scarf as I peered through the glass doors into the bar, looking for my immediate family. Mark was talking to my Auntie Sue – Mum’s younger sister – and I soon spotted Mark and Georgia’s kids, Keira and Regan. I say kids, but Keira was twenty-six, married and expecting her second baby in the spring and Regan was twenty-four and living with his long-term boyfriend Clarke. Every time I saw my niece and nephew, I experienced a moment of surprise that they were grown adults and not the little children I remembered chasing each other round the garden or splashing in the lake.
They all looked deep in conversation and I didn’t like to interrupt so I hovered by the coats, wringing my hands, trying to muster the businesswoman in me. She wasn’t fazed by walking into a room full of people and striking up conversations with strangers, so entering a room consisting mostly of family and former neighbours should be a breeze. But it wasn’t.
A couple I didn’t recognise arrived, smiled politely, and removed their coats. They made a show of trying to get round me to hang them up – my cue that I couldn’t loiter in the foyer forever. I apologised for being in their way, took a deep breath and pasted a smile on my face, steeling myself against the inevitable barrage of comments about my absence over the years.
Opening the door, I was immediately hit by a combination of heat emanating from a real fire mingled with the warmth of lots of bodies in a relatively small space. I eased my way through the bar, smiling and nodding but inwardly cringing as the predicted remarks came thick and fast. Several greetings of Hello, stranger! vied for popularity alongside Long time, no see! I caught whispers of I was beginning to think she wasn’t coming and one of the villagers even said it to my face, accompanied by, ‘Your mum’s going to be so happy to see you at last,’ the final two words spoken with great emphasis after a pause. Made me wonder what Mum had been saying to her friends about me.
Even though the comments were delivered light-heartedly (the whispers perhaps not so much), I couldn’t help feeling judged.
‘Auntie Mel!’ Keira cried, approaching me with her arms out for a hug and rescuing me from a conversation with another villager about how long it had been since my last visit.
‘Great to see you,’ I said, hugging her. I stepped back and took in her baby bump. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘Really good. Did Mum tell you what we’re having?’
‘No, she wanted it to be your news.’ Keira and Johnnie already had a two-year-old girl called Astrid. They hadn’t wanted to find out the gender when they were expecting her and had intended on remaining in blissful ignorance with baby number two but curiosity had got the better of them.
Keira removed a scan photo from her handbag and passed it to me. ‘Meet Astrid’s little brother, Arlo.’
It would be customary to say something at that point – give my congratulations, tell her Arlo was a great name, comment on how cute it was that both siblings had names beginning with the same letter, say how lovely it was that they’d have a boy and a girl – but I had nothing. I stared at the baby photo, instantly transported back in time to when I’d held a scan photo of my own, almost an identical match to this one.
All the way through Keira’s first pregnancy, I’d been convinced she was expecting a boy and had tried so hard to prepare myself for it. I’d almost cried with relief when Georgia rang me with the news that the proud parents had welcomed a baby girl into the world. But now they were having a boy and I needed to get my act together. Quickly.
‘Are you all right?’ Keira asked, looking at me with concern.
‘Hot flush,’ I said, pulling at the neckline of my dress with one hand as I handed back the photo. ‘The joys of being a woman of a certain age. Congratulations. I’m so pleased for you all and I can’t wait to meet baby Arlo.’
I wafted my neckline again and tucked my hair behind my ears. ‘Sorry, Keira, I’m going to have to nip to the ladies’ to cool off. I’ll speak to you later.’
Without waiting for a response, I made a beeline for the toilets, relieved to find them deserted. I placed my hands either side of one of the sinks and braced my arms as I took several calming breaths. Raising my head to look in the mirror, I sighed. Hot flush? One glance at my paler-than-a-snowman’s cheeks and there was no way Keira would have bought that. Hopefully she’d get distracted and forget about my reaction.
The door opened and Auntie Sue entered, permeating the room with her signature lily-of-the-valley fragrance. She smiled as soon as she saw me and drew me into a hug, kissing me on both cheeks.
‘Lovely to see you, Mel. How are you doing?’
‘Fine, thanks. You?’
‘Wonderful. I swear that op has given me a new lease of life.’
I had no idea Auntie Sue had needed an operation. She’d likely assumed one of the family had told me, but they hadn’t and, to be fair to them, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d asked after my auntie. With no kids of her own, she’d always been really close to Georgia and me and I should have made more effort to stay in touch. One more thing to feel guilty about.
‘That’s great news,’ I said. ‘We must catch up properly later. Have you seen Mum?’
‘She’s in the conservatory with your dad and Georgia. The landlord just announced ten minutes until we can join them so, if you haven’t already got yourself a drink, you might want to wait. There’s drinks on the tables.’
‘Thanks for the heads-up.’
Auntie Sue disappeared into a cubicle and I headed towards the conservatory in search of my parents and sister. The double doors were closed and there was an A3 sheet taped to one of them.
Welcome to June’s 80th birthday
Please relax in the bar until called through.
Thank you!
There was a lovely photo of Mum on the sign. I hadn’t seen it before but I recognised her surroundings as the back garden at Derwent Rise. Either side of the door were easels on which rested boards full of photos. The board on the left depicted Mum’s first four decades and the one on the right showed the next four. All the photos were at jaunty angles and mounted on pretty patterned paper with floral stickers and swirls filling in the gaps. Guilt prodded me again. This was Georgia’s work and it must have taken her hours to create. She’d said she was displaying a few photos but I hadn’t imagined something as impressive as this. I could have helped if I’d known this was the plan, although perhaps I should have realised. It was Georgia, after all, and she never did things by halves, especially when it came to anything creative.
I peered through the glass, debating as to whether to go in or take heed of the sign. Directly opposite the door at the far side of the room was a long table and Mum was sitting on a chair pulled out at the end of it. Nearby was a small table holding a three-tier birthday cake. By the looks of it, Mum was directing Georgia on the angle to display the cake while also directing Dad on where to place a pair of giant silver balloons in the shape of an eight and zero. I smiled as I watched them. Mum did like everything to be just so. The interior of Derwent Rise was always immaculate with everything in its right place. When we were kids, Georgia and I used to wind her up by moving her ornaments a couple of centimetres and seeing if she’d notice. She never said anything, but they always moved back. We escalated our mischief with swapping ornaments around and, once more, they moved back with nothing said. Then I went and took it too far, swapping her favourite figurine of an Edwardian flower seller with the toilet brush. In my defence, the toilet brush was clean and dry, but Mum read me the riot act for that one and we never messed with her belongings again.
I slowly pressed down on the door handle and crept inside.
‘But Mum! This is where it was at the start!’
Georgia normally had the patience of a saint so they must have been faffing with the cake for quite some time for her to sound so exasperated.
‘It isn’t,’ Mum insisted.
‘It is. Exactly.’
‘Okay, it is, but it might have looked better from a different angle so it was worth a try.’
‘How long have you two been bickering?’ I asked, crossing the room, immediately kicking myself for such a negative opening statement. Couldn’t I have gone for a straightforward hello or happy birthday ?
‘We’re not bickering,’ Mum said, her tone a little defensive. ‘Just perfecting a few things. If you’re going to do something, you should do it well. You know that.’
It was Mum’s mantra for life and was the approach I took to my work. If only I’d managed to apply it to my personal life.
‘Happy birthday, Mum!’ I said as I bent down to hug her.
‘Thank you, Melanie. Your lovely card arrived yesterday, but why didn’t you save the postage and bring it today?’
‘I wanted you to have something to open when you woke up this morning.’
‘I see! That’s okay, then. We were concerned it meant you weren’t coming today.’
That sounded like a dig but I maintained my smile. ‘I did write look forward to celebrating with you inside.’
She nodded but didn’t respond, which I translated as they’re just words and it’s actions that count . Or was that my own guilt filling in the blanks?
‘I’ve missed you!’ Georgia launched herself at me and held me tightly.
‘The guests will appear at any moment,’ Dad said, so Georgia released me.
‘Good to see you, Mel,’ Dad said, giving me a quick hug. ‘Let’s get you over to the door, June.’
I stepped aside as Dad and Georgia helped Mum up from her chair.
‘Can you put the chair back?’ Dad asked me.
‘Sure.’ I pushed the chair back under the table and did a double take. Mum had linked her left arm through Georgia’s and her right arm through Dad’s. Since when had she needed help to walk? I caught Georgia’s eyes, my eyebrows raised in question. She shook her head slightly and focused back on assisting Mum.
I watched, my stomach in knots, as Mum shuffled across the room, clinging onto my dad and sister. A few years ago, after struggling with severe back pain, Mum had been diagnosed with degenerative disc disease or DDD. Not actually a disease, despite the name, DDD was a condition where the discs between the vertebrae deteriorated over time, affecting a person’s movement. Mum and Dad used to trek miles across the fells and I knew she’d stopped doing that the summer before last, but I had no idea her mobility had deteriorated to the point where she needed assistance from two people to cross a room. Why had nobody said anything? Another stab of guilt. Why hadn’t I asked? Or, better still, why hadn’t I visited more often to see for myself?
As the guests filtered in and were welcomed by my parents and Georgia at the door, I felt somewhat superfluous. They hadn’t asked me to join them and it didn’t feel right to include myself in the welcoming committee without an invitation. No way could I smile and laugh and give the impression that I was an important part of Mum’s special day when I didn’t feel as though I was. Their welcome hadn’t been overly warm, although, to be fair to them, there hadn’t been much time and they had been distracted. I kicked myself once more for not having the foresight to accept Georgia’s invitation to stay at hers last night.
I glanced around the room at the rapidly filling tables. They were rectangular, each set up with between six and ten chairs. There hadn’t been a seating plan outside so presumably guests would park themselves at a table appropriate to their group size and mingle after the buffet. The only reserved table was the large one where Mum had been sitting. I counted the chairs – nine plus a highchair, which had to be for Astrid. Mum and Dad plus Georgia’s family made eight adults so the ninth chair was either for me or Auntie Sue. If I was meant to be sitting with my parents, surely they’d have said something, although when would they have had the time with me turning up at the eleventh hour?
The last time I’d felt this uncomfortably conspicuous was when I was aged eight and in the school Christmas nativity dressed as a snowman because there would, of course, have been heavy snow in the Middle East at the birth of Christ. I managed to trip over my own feet, face plant the manger, send the baby Jesus flying into the audience where it clobbered Toby Parkin’s grandma on the head and broke her glasses. All the while I lay beached centre stage because my snowman costume was so round and padded that I couldn’t get up. And every single moment was caught on camera and, even worse, on camcorder to be trotted out at every possible humiliation opportunity.
There were no dark corners in the conservatory for me to retreat into and the only escape routes were a fire exit on the far side, which would activate an alarm, or pushing through all the guests filing in. So I was stuck there, hovering awkwardly between tables, smiling and saying hello in between nibbling on a piece of loose skin round one of my fingernails and making it bleed.
‘They haven’t told you where to sit, have they?’
I turned at his gentle voice and smiled gratefully at my nephew Regan and his boyfriend Clarke.
‘Is it that obvious?’ I asked Regan as I hugged him.
‘Gotta say, the helpless finger-chewing was a bit of a red flag.’
I glanced down woefully at my sore finger and tutted to myself before giving Clarke a hug, so grateful that they’d come to my rescue. I adored the pair of them. Although they were both country boys at heart, they enjoyed the occasional burst of city nightlife. Manchester’s Canal Street was their favourite destination but Newcastle’s Gay Village, also known as the Pink Triangle, came a close second. They always invited me to join them on a night out, which was sweet, but I usually politely declined, happier providing a bed for the night and a hearty breakfast in the morning. I’d joined them a few times to celebrate a birthday or other special occasion and it had been lovely but, like Mum, I just wasn’t a late-night person. It seemed to take me a week to get over it, even if I wasn’t drinking. I much preferred to be up with the lark and tucked up in bed by ten.
‘You’re sitting with us on Grandma’s table,’ Regan said.
‘What about Auntie Sue?’
‘She’s with the other rellies.’
Mum was Auntie Sue’s only remaining immediate family member but the pair of them had several cousins, most of whom were here today, so it made sense that Auntie Sue would join them.
Regan and Clarke led me to the reserved table.
‘Anywhere in particular I should sit?’ I asked, not wanting to make a faux pas by sitting in the wrong place.
‘Grandma’ll be in the centre facing her guests,’ Regan said, ‘and Granddad’ll be next to her. Unless you want to feed Astrid, I’d suggest the opposite end to the highchair with us.’
‘Facing the guests or back to them?’ Clarke asked me.
‘Definitely my back to them. I know they’ll be talking about me but I’d rather not see it.’
‘What they’ll be talking about is how fabulous those boots are,’ Clarke said, glancing down at my high-heeled purple ankle boots. ‘They’re divine. New purchase?’
‘Especially for today.’
‘Loving the accessories too.’
My hand immediately went to the matching purple pendant hanging over my charcoal-grey wool dress. I used to wear bright colours all the time but, when the colour unexpectedly left my world seven years ago, it left my wardrobe too. Now everything I wore was muted with only accent colours in my footwear and/or a piece of jewellery. Would colour ever fully return to my life?
Keira and Johnnie came over and Johnnie settled Astrid into the highchair while Keira retrieved some toys and a juice bottle from an enormous changing bag. I glanced round the room while they were getting themselves settled. The decorations were peach, silver and cream and Mum was wearing the same colours. I wondered if she’d chosen her outfit then matched the decorations to it or whether it had been the other way round. I probably should have known. It was easy to rule myself out of organising things because I didn’t live locally, but I could have asked questions. I could have been part of this.
Mark appeared shortly after and gave me a hug as he sat down beside me and finally Mum, Dad and Georgia joined us. There were bottles of red, white and rosé wine on the table, pitchers of water and a jug of fresh orange. I reached for the latter and filled my glass. I’d accepted Georgia’s invitation to stay at hers tonight and was meant to be leaving my car here overnight so I could have a drink but, with a strong flight urge kicking in, I wanted to keep my options open. I might drive back to Newcastle tonight instead.
Once everyone was settled, Dad tapped his knife against his glass, hushing the guests as he rose to his feet. I expected a quick welcome and a happy birthday toast to Mum, but it was a proper speech. He shared that they’d met at work but it had taken him a whopping eighteen months to pluck up the courage to ask her out and how grateful he was that his dithering hadn’t lost her. He talked about how happy Mum made him and how proud he was to be by her side celebrating her eightieth birthday. Dad wasn’t one for public speaking or declarations of feelings and he had me tearing up. It was funny how I just thought of them as my parents rather than a couple still deeply in love after sixty years together.
When he finished, Mum rose and spoke about how wonderful Dad was and how grateful she was for the beautiful family they’d raised.
‘Doesn’t the room look gorgeous?’ she said, sweeping her gaze from left to right. ‘This is all thanks to my eldest daughter, Georgia.’ She looked down affectionately at my sister seated beside her. ‘She booked the venue, organised the invitations, sorted out the decorations and the cake and even took me shopping for my outfit so I have a thank you gift for you, my angel.’
Dad produced a stunning bouquet of flowers and Georgia hugged my parents and thanked them for the gift before sitting back down, her cheeks glowing. It was then back to Dad who raised a toast to Mum, instigated a chorus of ‘Happy Birthday to You’, and declared the buffet open in the function room next door.
I smiled, lifted my glass and sang along with everyone else but it was a struggle to get the words out over the lump in my throat. It was right that Mum had acknowledged Georgia for organising her party. I didn’t expect or deserve a mention because I’d done nothing, but it hurt that she hadn’t mentioned me by name at any point during her speech. When she’d talked about her beautiful family , she’d specifically name-checked Georgia and Mark. She’d named her grandchildren and their partners and her great-grandchild. She mentioned my beloved sister Susanna , blowing a kiss to Auntie Sue, and named their cousins. Yet she hadn’t mentioned me. I hoped it was an oversight rather than a deliberate slight. It could be that she’d thought the blanket term of my beautiful family was enough to cover us all, but why use that and then name every single family member present except for me? Even Arlo was mentioned and we wouldn’t get to meet him until March.
Hopefully I’d been the only one to notice and we could forget about it, but when the guests started moving out for the buffet, I felt Regan’s and Clarke’s eyes on me. Regan placed his hand over mine.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked.
‘Of course!’ My voice sounded strained as it forced past the growing lump in my throat. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’
He squeezed my hand. ‘It won’t have been deliberate.’
‘If it was, I deserve it.’
‘No, you don’t,’ the pair of them chorused.
I looked from Regan’s eyes to Clarke’s, my own filling with tears. ‘Don’t be nice to me. It’ll tip me over the edge.’ I drew a deep breath. ‘So, how are the plans going for your side hustle?’
They’d met at art college, bonded over a shared passion for Victorian design, and now both worked for Clarke’s family’s business – Darrowby’s Auction House & Removals, known locally as just Darrowby’s. Most of their work was on the auction side of the business, undertaking house clearances, valuing items and running auctions. They loved it and had no intention of leaving but they were steadily building a side business capitalising on their artistic talents by designing Victorian-inspired textiles.
As I listened to them enthusiastically updating me on their business plans, my melancholy lifted momentarily but, when we returned from the buffet a little later, it came back. Everything had looked and smelled delicious, but I had no appetite for it and struggled to eat the few items I’d added to my plate. Looking down the table at my family chatting and laughing, I had the sensation of being on the edge of everything. There were updates on things I knew nothing about and in-jokes which made me very aware of how much of an outsider I’d become. Nobody had pushed me out. It was all on me. I hadn’t just removed myself from my family physically by moving across the country to Newcastle. I’d removed myself emotionally. If Mum not mentioning me in her speech had been deliberate, that was all on me too.