Chapter 26
I wake up feeling stiff and tired. I’d never have believed, when I was young, that I could spend ten hours in bed and be tired at the end of it, but that’s old age for you.
I sit on the edge of the bed and do some gentle stretching.
Rotate my neck in a circle, roll my shoulders.
Dot’s still snoring away, but I couldn’t sleep properly past five.
We have a slow start to the day, breakfast cereal and the news, like always. It’s funny how we’ve fallen into a pattern so quickly, and it is these routines, rather than the ones I had with Arthur, that feel like the right ones.
We’re expecting John and Claudia, and I’m not much looking forward to it, because I’m sure he doesn’t like me.
She seems pleasant enough, at least. At ten o’clock, we’re working on the jigsaw, on the row of cottages, when there’s a ring on the doorbell.
Dot says something about how he’s always been punctual, and gets up to let them in.
We all hug, one after another, and it’s slightly awkward.
‘Cup of tea?’ Dot asks. She’s already got the mugs out.
‘I thought we could have a run out. A bit of a drive, and then maybe tea and cake in a café somewhere?’
‘That sounds nice,’ I say.
‘Are you sure you want to get straight back in the car, after driving all the way here?’ Dot asks.
‘It’s a lovely day,’ Claudia says, and I’m not sure what difference that makes one way or the other.
We gather our cardigans and handbags and follow them out to John’s Renault. After we’ve all got in and done our seatbelts up, the car is quiet until we’ve eased out of the town and onto country roads. We pass churches and primary schools, little rows of shops and children’s playgrounds.
I think about what Dot’s told me, about all the worrying she’s done over the years.
She said John was always a loner, at school and then in life.
Rarely any mention of friends, and never a partner.
She said that a few years ago, she gave herself a good talking to.
Said that this is just how he is, that it’s not something for her to try to fix or rectify.
It’s just him. Solitary but happy. And now there’s Claudia, and how is she finding adjusting to that?
Perhaps it’s something we should talk about more.
Dot’s giving directions from the back seat beside me, and we end up in a village I haven’t visited in years.
‘Pull in here,’ she says. It’s a small gravel car park, no sign of a ticket machine. ‘There’s a café just around that corner. I used to go there, sometimes, with my mum, and I happened to pass it the other day.’
It’s a cosy sort of place with framed prints on the walls that depict city skylines. We order drinks and scones with jam and cream, and John and Dot bicker over who’s going to pay. And then as soon as we’re sitting down, John clears his throat and starts talking.
‘We’re thinking of moving,’ he says. Then he gestures between himself and Claudia, as if he’s worried we might not know who he means.
‘Where to?’ Dot asks.
‘The south of France.’
I look at Dot, try to gauge her reaction.
‘How wonderful,’ she says, and I think she means it.
‘Really?’
‘Of course. Did you think I’d say something else? You know I’m always in favour of an adventure.’
‘I wasn’t sure,’ John says. ‘It’s a long way, and you’re getting on.
I mean, we’re all getting on.’ He takes a sip of his coffee and then winces because it’s still too hot.
‘Claudia has a place there. It was her parents’, and they’re both gone now, so she was going to put it on the market.
But then we went out there for a few days, a month or so ago, and we loved it.
We realised there was nothing standing in our way, except… ’
‘Except what?’ There’s a glint in Dot’s eye. She knows that his hesitation is about leaving his elderly mother behind.
‘Well…’
‘John,’ she says, putting a hand over his on the table. ‘Is this about me?’
‘Yes,’ he says, clearly relieved not to have had to be the one to say it. ‘I mean, who knows what sort of help you’ll need over the coming years?’
He’s right, of course. Anything could happen at any time. But Dot and I have learned a thing or two over our long lives and also over these past few weeks. We’ve learned that you have to grab things when they come to you.
‘If you didn’t go because of me, I would feel terrible.
Look, John, I’m over the moon that you two have found each other and that you’re happy.
And if you’ll be happier still in this house in France, then you must go there.
I might need help, of course I might. But I have Mabel and there’s William and the grandchildren. And…’
I’m expecting her to say that she has friends here in Broughton, too, but if that’s what she’s thinking, she doesn’t vocalise it.
‘And I might have a heart attack and drop dead in six months or a year and what good would you staying have done, if that happens?’
‘Don’t talk like that,’ he says.
‘I’m eighty-six,’ Dot says. ‘I won’t go on forever.
You know that as well as I do. But I have people around me, like I say, and I have some money put away.
It’s not all on you. So I actually insist, John, that you do this.
You’ve spent your whole life on your own and you must make the most of the time you have with Claudia now. ’
John smiles a little crookedly and looks at Claudia, and it’s clear that there is real love there between them.
‘I don’t know whether it would be too much for you and Mabel to visit,’ he says.
‘We’ll certainly look into it. When will you go?’
He holds his hands up in a gesture that suggests our guess is as good as his.
‘We need to think about what we’ll do with our houses here.
Whether we’ll sell them or rent them out, in case we change our minds.
But after that, I suppose there’s nothing else to wait for.
I imagine it will be in the next six months. ’
‘After September?’ Dot asks.
John’s brow furrows. ‘I expect so. Why?’
‘Because Mabel and I would like to invite you both to a wedding.’
Claudia lets out a small shriek and we stand up and there are hugs, and this time it’s more comfortable.
‘Where will you do it?’ John asks, once we’ve sat down again. He takes a bite of his scone and a bit of clotted cream stays on his face, above his lip. Claudia reaches across with a napkin and dabs it away.
‘Broughton, we think,’ Dot says.
‘We’ll look forward to it,’ Claudia says.
Shortly after, she excuses herself to go to the toilet, and Dot takes the opportunity to ask John something.
‘I hope you don’t think I’m overstepping, John, but I’ve always wondered – why do you think you never chose to get married?’
If he’s embarrassed, he doesn’t show it. ‘Well, you have to meet someone to get married, Mum.’
‘I know. That’s what I mean, really. Why do you think you never met anyone, before now? Or did you, and you just never told me about them?’
John pauses, gathers his thoughts. ‘I saw how it was with you and Dad,’ he starts.
‘You were so unhappy, and he was so rarely there, and when he was, the atmosphere in the house was terrible. I think I just felt like I didn’t want any part of that, for many years.
I didn’t feel equipped to have a romantic relationship.
I didn’t want to make someone unhappy the way he did with you. ’
Dot looks as if she’s been punched.
‘There was Geoff and Rupert; I could see that they were happy and loved each other. But that seemed like a different thing, somehow, with them both being men. I only really looked to you and Dad for an example.’
‘Oh,’ Dot says.
‘I don’t blame you,’ John adds, and I think it’s probably a bit late for that.
‘What about William?’ Dot asks.
‘William was younger. I don’t think he was aware in the same way I was.’
Then Claudia’s back and we decide to go for a bit of a walk. Somehow, Dot falls into step with Claudia and I end up walking alongside John. We’re quiet for a bit, and when he speaks it’s nothing I would ever have expected.
‘I want to thank you, Mabel,’ he says.
I stop for a moment and look at him. ‘Thank me? Whatever for?’
He looks at me, and for a second I think he’s going to take hold of my hand, but he doesn’t, and we start walking again, though we’ve fallen quite far behind Dot and Claudia.
‘I’ve always felt quite responsible for Mum, being the eldest. And it wasn’t until you found her that I realised how much that had impacted my own life.
It’s true what I said back there, about her and Dad, but I think it’s also true that I felt it was my job to be around to catch her if she ever needed that.
Not that she has. Anyway, this move Claudia and I are making, there’s no way I would have considered that a year ago. I feel like I’ve been freed, a little.’
I’m flabbergasted. ‘I thought you didn’t like me,’ I say.
John laughs, and I realise it’s the first time I’ve heard him do so. ‘Not at all. If anything, I just wish she’d had you all along.’
‘You wouldn’t be here if she had,’ I say.
‘That’s true. Perhaps it’s all worked out exactly as it should have.’
We’re quiet while we think about that.
* * *
Much later, we’re in bed when Dot’s voice reaches out across the darkness.
‘I stayed longer than I wanted to, for them. That’s what everyone said you should do.’
I take her hand, feel the wrinkles and folds of it. Imagine her then, a young woman with the wrong husband and two young boys. ‘You didn’t do anything wrong.’
‘Oh, I did. We all do, don’t we? I was too short-tempered, too impatient. I know my shortcomings. I just didn’t think that staying with their father was one of my mistakes.’
She falls asleep soon after that, her hand still in mine. And I lie there for a while, thinking about love, and getting things wrong, and getting them right.