Chapter 27
Rose
It is boiling hot, and my thighs are chafing. I very unwisely decided on a sundress today, which undoubtedly means I will have lobster-red shoulders by the end of our walk. But that’s okay – at least they’ll match my face.
I’m feeling down, for so many reasons, and also feel bad because Mum wanted us to remember the good times. Looking around as we traipse up the hill, I can remember them – but those memories are distant, intangible, like faraway scenes from somebody else’s life.
We came in Poppy’s car, which made sense as mine is on its last legs, and parked down the lane, after a journey spent in stony silence.
So far, I feel like we’re technically doing what Mum asked – but neither of us seems to have the will to storm the barricades and embrace it in spirit as well.
Two days apart, while Lewis sorted out the cremation situation, have only served to make us both even more entrenched on our respective sides of the fence.
Still. We’re here, and we’re doing it, and perhaps for now, that’s all that matters.
Poppy has the picnic basket, which she has filled, and I have the cardboard box, hanging over my shoulder in one of those Bags 4 Life, which is ironic when you consider its current contents.
Joe has been dispatched to London to see his dad and, as ever, I became a morose lump the minute his train pulled away from the platform, waving him off with a fake smile on my face. I try not to let him see how much I will miss him, but he’s not daft, and he always texts me the minute he’s left.
He’ll be gone for three weeks, as usual in the summer, and I hope he enjoys it.
It’s probably for the best, all things considered – it will give me and Poppy time to get through this, without dragging him through the mire of all our emotional baggage.
He’ll enjoy himself at his dad’s, and is excited about spending time with his range of half-siblings.
It’s a part of his life I’ll never be involved in, and it’s good for him to have time away.
From me, from our house, from everything that’s playing out around him.
Now, we’re here, and Poppy is galloping ahead on her stupidly long legs, showing off her superior cardio-vascular fitness levels, looking like a dark, skinny streak as she bounds towards the stone circle.
I think she looks a bit too thin – a bit too fit – but that could very well just be jealousy speaking.
She comes to a standstill in the middle, and waits for me to catch up.
I do so, trying to hide how hard I’m puffing, and we stand together, gazing around.
Some of the stones are small and jagged, poking up from the earth like old grey teeth.
Others are smooth from the thousands of bottoms that have sat on them, admiring the views over the hills.
The biggest – the Witch Stone – is tall and rugged, and I walk over, laying my hands on it and enjoying the texture.
At the moment we’re the only people here, although it’s a popular route for dog walkers.
We’re surrounded by beautiful countryside, hills and valleys in dazzling shades of green, colliding with the vivid blue of the sky.
I can hear skylarks singing, and the buzzing of small insects, and the distant mooing of cows.
It’s utterly and completely peaceful, and I can see why the ancient dudes chose exactly this spot to build their stone circle.
I’m not one for hippy-dippy shit, but this place does feel special – even the touch of the stone beneath my fingers has a certain restful energy to it. I wish Joe was here to see it all, and make a pledge to bring him back one day, under happier circumstances.
Poppy joins me, and places both her hands on the Witch Stone. Her long hair is tied up in a ponytail, and it makes her look younger.
Our fingers briefly touch on the stone, and we both jerk away a little, like we’ve had an electric shock.
All it takes is that tiny contact to unleash at least some of the memories I’ve subconsciously been trying to avoid.
They play out in my mind, still unreal, still tethered in some alternate universe that exists only in the past.
‘Do you remember coming here?’ I ask, leaning my face against the cool surface of the stone. ‘And the way Mum always made us both dance round the stones, making up chants? Something about a picnic goddess?’
She smiles, and I realise that I’ve not seen her smile for … well, years. And I realise that I’ve missed it.
‘I do remember. She sang it like a nursery rhyme, prancing around like a loon: “Goddess Good, Goddess Fair, please don’t leave our hamper bare …”’
As she chants, I can almost hear my mother’s voice, trying to sound serious and sacred, us two giggling on her heels, pigtails flying, feet encased in the jelly sandals that were the very height of childhood fashion back then.
‘“Bring us an apple,”’ I continue, smiling at the thought, ‘“bring us a pear, bring us a Mars Bar if you dare …”’
‘Then wasn’t there something about cow shit?’ asks Poppy, frowning as she tries to dig up the line.
‘Kind of,’ I reply. ‘Although she was far too much of a lady to use words like that. What was it? Something like “Goddess Good, Goddess Pure, shelter us from cow manure …”?’
Poppy laughs, and I can’t help but join in. I don’t really want to – it is far easier to cling to my protective barrier of silence – but I do. The sound echoes around the stones, blending in with the birdsong and the buzzing, as though it belongs there, hovering in the sun-hazed air.
‘She really was a bit of a nutter, wasn’t she?’ asks Poppy, pulling away from the stone and picking up the wicker basket again.
‘Yep,’ I reply, reluctantly removing my hands from the Witch Stone. ‘She really was. Come on. We still have another hill to climb.’
We continue our trek upwards, interrupted by occasional walkers and one especially intrusive beagle that takes an unhealthy interest in Poppy’s crotch.
We are both quiet again, as though that one tiny step towards each other has worn us out.
Scared us, maybe. Looking at Poppy’s rigid expression, the way she is concentrating on the path, I can tell that she is tense, bundled up in the same anxiety that I am, wearing it like a suit of armour.
We pick our way through the paths, weaving around the bushes and patches of flowers that dot the heathland, climbing stiles and crossing bridges and going through gates, passing more stone circles, until we eventually reach the top of the hill.
The view, as I make my way up to join Poppy, is spectacular, stretching and tumbling out around us, an ancient landscape that seems to be caught in time.
I can’t even see the electricity pylons that I know must be there.
I would appreciate the view more, but by this time, I am struggling – even with a relatively gentle climb like this one; my body is complaining, my lungs whining and my legs straining.
I’ve been a stranger to exercise for so long, and it is added to a now very long list of things I am unhappy about.
I’m sickened by my own lack of fitness – and I’m not talking about running-a-marathon or doing-a-triathlon fitness, I’m talking about going-for-a-walk fitness.
Liverpool is largely flat, and a gentle stroll on the beach near our home isn’t exactly challenging – not that I even bother doing that, these days.
I tend to just park the car and watch the sunsets from the Ford Fiesta instead of getting out there and enjoying it.
When I was a kid, we would be all over these hills, scrambling up and down them like mountain goats in patched jeans, running for the joy of it, shouting into the wind, filled with energy.
And when Joe was little, I wasn’t too bad – you have to get out and about with kids, or you end up wanting to kill them.
But these days, as Joe gets himself from A to B, and I drive everywhere, I’ve sunk into a pit of inactivity.
I don’t like it – it makes me feel weak, and vulnerable, and as though I’d be the first to die in a zombie attack.
I suppose, perhaps, that I need to change it.
I’ll never be like Poppy – I was never as limber or as agile, even when we were little – but I could most definitely be a new and improved version of myself.
Maybe, by the time I bring Joe back here, I’ll be able to actually enjoy it, instead of wheezing like a vandalised steam engine.
Poppy is standing still at the summit, a few feet away and, as I look up at her, I see a strange expression on her face.
I’d expected contempt, possibly disgust, but instead, I see …
sympathy. For some reason, this makes me feel even worse, and I put on as much of a sprint as I can to catch up with her.
By the time I do, she is opening the hamper, making herself busy – deliberately, I suspect, to give me the chance to catch my breath again. Allowing me some dignity as I suck in air. A small kindness that I don’t want to be on the receiving end of.
She pulls the achingly familiar black-and-red tartan blanket out, gathers it into her fists, and sniffs it so hard it looks as if she is inhaling it whole.
I screw my eyes shut, and try not to cry.
I know what she is doing – she is looking for the lost traces of our mother – and it is like a punch to the heart.
I fight the urge to run at her, snatch the bobbled fleece from her hands, and do exactly the same.
She throws it out, and stretches it over the shaggy grass, and starts to unpack the picnic.
So much for an apple, a pear and a Mars Bar if you dare – there’s practically the entire contents of a posh deli here.
Slivers of Parma ham, smoked salmon, a chunk of Brie, cherries, nectarines.
Granary bread rolls, pastries, a small glass jar of duck paté.
Just as I think she’s finished, she produces a box of Ritz crackers and a plastic tub of cocktail sausages. My childhood favourites.