Chapter 16
Oh, lordy. I felt nervous on Mum’s behalf.
‘If anyone French is watching, I do apologise. Even I can hear how English that sounded and I’m going deaf.’ Maeve glanced beyond the camera, no doubt, at Jackson. ‘How do I look?’ she asked, beaming.
‘Great,’ he replied.
Much to my surprise, Jackson was right. Mum’s eyes sparkled and ignoring her dodgy accent, her tone was confident and friendly.
She appeared remarkably relaxed for someone who wasn’t tech or presenter savvy.
Watching her, it was obvious she could teach everyone at Foredale and Frogmore a thing or two.
Maeve nodded at Jackson and returning her attention to her audience, she took a deep breath and fixed a smile on her face. ‘Now I know what you’re thinking. What’s an old woman like me doing here on TickyTok? Am I right or am I right?’
‘TickyTok? Mum, please.’
‘Well, you can blame my daughter for that.’
I cocked my head. ‘No, you can’t!’ I hadn’t once mentioned social media to Mum.
‘She keeps nagging me to put myself out there. Telling me I need to meet new people.’
‘In real life, Mum. Not on the internet.’
‘Now don’t get me wrong, Erin has a point.’
‘Good of you to say,’ I replied.
‘But it’s all right for her, she’s young.’
Too hot, too cold or just right, as with Goldilocks and her preferred porridge, Mum’s assessment was subjective. What she called young, Callum considered past it.
‘But people my age are either dead…’ Maeve continued, ‘…or living on borrowed time. Not something a woman of seventy-nine like me needs reminding of. Especially when I’ve not long buried my husband.
And while we’ve all heard the joke about funerals being social occasions for us old folk, black’s never been my colour.
’ She put a hand up to her chest. ‘It drains me.’
I let out a laugh. Mum had always had a deadpan sense of humour. I just hoped it translated to her audience otherwise, like Joyce in her naivety, Mum could be in for a rough ride.
‘I also keep thinking about Derek. I can’t help it. We were together for fifty odd years, married for most of them. We did everything together.’
‘Oh, Mum.’
‘I never ever dreamt I’d have to build a life without him, and it probably sounds daft, but there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to.’
‘That doesn’t sound daft at all.’
‘It feels disloyal somehow.’ As Maeve turned pensive, the shine in her eyes dulled.
‘Then there’s the part that doesn’t know how.
Where do I even start? I’m so used to doing everything as a twosome, I’ve forgotten what it’s like to just think of me.
To do things without having to consider someone else.
’ She gathered herself. ‘Anyway, Erin thinks I should join the senior citizen’s club.
Don’t get me wrong, if that works for you, then brilliant.
It’s just not for me. And while Erin might not understand that, Derek would.
If things were the other way round, he wouldn’t be happy with Wednesday afternoon dominoes either. He and I were two peas in a pod.’
Seeing Mum’s eyes water up and listening to her heartfelt words, I wondered if I’d been too pushy? Because it was all right for me. A life on my own had been a choice. Mum, however, had been forced into a new order and navigating a future without Dad had to be scary.
‘Not that me and Derek never had a cross word, mind,’ Maeve carried on.
‘If I said we didn’t, I’d be lying. I mean, I’ve still not forgiven him for leaving me.
I’ve told him off that many times, wherever he is, his ears must be burning.
’ Maeve pulled a tissue from her pocket and wiped her eyes. ‘But what I can say is, I was lucky.’
‘You sure were.’ As bad as Mum, tears started for me too and swiping at them with my sleeve, I pictured Mum and Dad together.
‘Derek was a good man. A good husband. And talk about funny. The two of us did laugh. When he passed away, it was as if a part of me was buried with him. Derek would say one of my legs. Why else would I be stuck indoors all the time?’ She mopped her eyes again.
‘In my defence, he always was more energetic than me.’
I chuckled.
‘Mornings were the worst. All I’d want was a quiet cup of tea.
To gently wake up to the world. Not a lot to ask, is it?
But how can you do that when someone’s wittering on about plans for the day, deciding what we need from the shops, and asking where I want the new shelf he’s going to put up.
I wouldn’t have even had breakfast and Derek would be questioning what was for dinner that night.
’ Maeve sighed wistful. ‘What I’d do to experience all that now. ’
Mum wasn’t alone in that. The number of times I’d wished Dad was there too.
‘And I know if he could, Derek would say the same thing as Erin. He’d tell me to stop being silly and enjoy the time I have left.
’ Maeve fell silent, as if lost in her own thoughts for a moment.
‘So…’ she said, pulling herself together.
‘…after some consideration, that’s what I’ve decided to do.
I’m going to get out and about. And just as exciting, I’ll be documenting it here. A bit like a diary, if you will.’
As pleased as I felt to hear Mum was finally taking my advice, my stomach churned.
When it came to having an internet presence, she didn’t have a clue what she was letting herself in for.
Mum was opening herself up to all sorts of weirdos.
Her DMs would be full of American generals and doctors calling her dear.
They’d ask her for Grandma’s maiden name and enquire about her first pet; information that Mum, in her naivety, would readily give and before she knew it her bank account would be emptied.
Once she hit their algorithm, catfishes and scammers were going to rub their hands and possibly their…
‘Oh, no.’ I swallowed hard. Social media was unforgiving once you got on the wrong side of it and having been a victim of unsolicited dick pictures myself, I felt sick on Mum’s behalf.
‘With a little help from my friend Jackson,’ Maeve continued. ‘Jackson, come and say hello…’
Maeve’s young neighbour appeared on screen. He flicked his overgrown fringe from his eyes and gave Mum’s audience a swift one-one movement wave. ‘Hi there,’ he said.
I frowned as Jackson stepped back out of view. Mum might’ve been the star of the show, but as far as I was concerned, that didn’t mean he was off the hook.
‘Is that it?’ Maeve appeared disappointed. ‘Aren’t you going to introduce yourself?’ She paused to listen. ‘What do you mean? There’s nothing wrong with your hair.’ She listened some more. ‘Sorry. Yes. Back to TickyTok.’
If Mum had to sign up to an app the least she could do was use its proper name. I shook my head. ‘Tell me you’re new to social media, without telling me you’re new to social media.’
Maeve fidgeted in her seat. ‘Now don’t worry. We won’t be boring you with the likes of chair exercise and basket weaving. Jackson and I are going big.’
My brow knitted. ‘What do you mean? What are you talking about?’
‘We’re gonna learn to live again, aren’t we, lad?’
‘What’s this we business?’
‘Now, if you haven’t already grasped the clues of our first adventure…’
‘Adventure?’ Mum was raising more questions than she was answering.
‘…you’ll have to watch this space to find out more. Oh, and please leave a comment. I’m told that’s what people do here on TickyTok.’ Maeve gave her audience a smile. ‘I suppose all that’s left to say is Au revoir, tout le monde.’ She copied Jackson’s one movement wave. ‘à bient?t!’
As Mum’s video went into auto replay, my mind whirred.
There was obviously a connection between it and her current leave of absence, but as I looked for the clues she’d referred to, my eyes and ears failed me.
Despite her claim, Mum revealed nothing and because she was sitting on Dad’s bench which faced the garden, all I saw was the kitchen window and a brick wall behind her.
Refusing to be beaten, I got up from the sofa and taking my torch with me, headed outside. Frustrated, I shone it around the area in which Mum had filmed, but the only item of note was a half-dead potted lavender. ‘There’s got to be something here.’ I continued to scan but it was to no avail.
Flummoxed, I plonked myself down on Dad’s bench and considered the video in its entirety.
Mum speaking in a foreign language… There was nothing new there; the woman had been obsessed with French for months.
Her beret and Breton jumper… A questionable fashion choice she probably thought made her look quirky for the camera.
Talk of an adventure… Mum hardly left the house so even a bus ride to Leeds would be massive.
I raised the torch and again lit up the potted plant. Images of Provence lavender fields flitted through my mind. ‘No,’ I said. ‘That’s too obvious.’ Glancing further afield, my gaze automatically returned to the pot. ‘She wouldn’t. Not without telling me. Not right before Christmas.’
I jumped up from my seat and ran back into the house. Heading straight for the dining room, I put my torch to one side and opening one dresser drawer after another, I rifled through each of them until they were almost empty. ‘It’s got to be here,’ I said. ‘This is where she keeps it.’
Pausing, I put one hand on my hip and the other against my forehead as I surveyed the mess I’d made.
With no passport in sight, it seemed I finally knew where Mum and Jackson had gone and I envisaged the two of them on an aeroplane, chatting about cheese, wine and the Mona Lisa as they buckled themselves up ready for take-off. ‘Mum, how could you?’
The words how, when and why ran through my mind and as I paced up and down, I wanted to cry. In less than twenty-four hours I’d gone from thinking I was up for a promotion to finding out my job was at risk, to having a grieving Mum who’d finally lost all sense of reason.
I picked up my phone and opened Mum’s most recent message – Betty White mimicking Usain Bolt under the words old but still lit then looked in the direction of the lounge where my laptop sat waiting for me to write my presentation. ‘And I thought I was ruining Christmas.’
I recalled a previous visit when I’d walked in to find a smog-filled kitchen thanks to a pan of potatoes that had been left to boil dry.
With Mum nowhere in sight, the deafening screams of the smoke alarm almost burst my eardrums as I threw open the back door and removed the charred pot from the heat.
I was still cursing when Mum appeared with a towel around her head, seemingly oblivious to the danger she’d been in.
‘I nipped up for a shower and forgot about it,’ she simply said in response, her matter-of-fact reaction doing nothing to allay the what-ifs running around my brain. ‘I’m not the first to ruin a pan and I certainly won’t be the last.’
In my view, her charred and blackened cookware could easily have turned into a burning building. While in Mum’s view, I needed to stop being a drama queen.
My chest tightened. If Mum couldn’t remember she’d put a pan on the stove, how was she going to remember the way back to her hotel after a day’s sightseeing.
I pictured her and Jackson getting separated in a crowd.
Mum becoming lost and confused as, taking one wrong turn after another, she tried to navigate a foreign city.
My heart raced at the prospect but I told myself not to panic and that I could be wrong.
Realising there was only one way to know for sure, I headed out into the hall, put on my coat and slipped my feet into my work heels. Not the best footwear to be wearing in sub-zero temperatures but I had little choice and steeling myself, I grabbed my torch again and walked out the front door.