Ashleigh and Remy Brett 1975 Aged 13 #3
She was sure her mum was still talking, but rather than listen, yet again, to the many ways Remy had royally, to the best of her mother’s knowledge, cocked up her future and flushed all chance of success down the pan, she stared out of the window that was starting to fog up, and in her head she played the latest Bay City Rollers song that the radio loved.
Bye Bye Baby . . .
Her dad pulled into the car park and drove with caution between a khaki-coloured Wolseley and a shiny claret-toned Jaguar.
‘I tell you one thing, Ruthie,’ he chuckled, ‘I definitely cannot afford to bash anything in this car park, for the paintwork repairs on these beauties alone, they’d take the house!’
She saw her mother’s shoulders tense, as if this new worry, making it off the premises without losing their home, was one to now occupy her mind. It sent a shiver of regret along her bones; she needed to be nicer to her mum today.
Before they left their car, which looked tiny and a bit battered, her dad tried the driver’s door handle to make sure it was locked, twice. With his eyes popping, he took in the array of expensive vehicles that filled the place.
He whistled and shook his head as he put his arms into his blazer and straightened his tie, the one with the little gold logo on it.
And she hated it. Hated how impressed he was with the overt displays of wealth, the way her mum grabbed his hand and held it fast, trying to look confident, doing her best to fade into the background.
Although that was never going to be easy.
Her dress and matching overcoat with their bold floral pattern of pink and orange were beacons, bright, bright things among the clipped hedges, the ivy-covered flint walls, the raked gravel and pretty litter bins.
In another mood, on another day, she’d have given thanks that with her mother dressed like that, no one was going to give her kilt and clumpy shoes a second glance.
But not today.
A thought struck her then, an unpleasant one: was part of her reticence to attend because she had known it would be like this?
Her mum and dad bending over backwards to fit in, while sticking out like sore thumbs – and how would Ashleigh react to the lot of them being on her turf, in her world, if only for a day?
‘Isn’t this beautiful?’ She spoke with false joy, arms wide and strength to her tone, doing her best to make the day the best it could be, for them all. This was what she did, fixed things, for Ashleigh; for her parents too.
Ruthie Brett beamed at her, clearly relieved, happy she was on board, yet with an underlying sadness to her tone as she spoke. ‘It really is, my love. Quite something.’
Remy trotted beside them towards the main school building and the quadrangle beyond, filling in the blanks of her mother’s sentence, and it could have been yours too . . .
‘Good morning!’ A random master with his gown flapping behind him in the breeze walked past and greeted them.
‘Hello.’
‘Hello!’
Her parents held on tightly to each other and responded in tandem.
As the three walked forward, she looked through the stone arch towards the quadrangle in all its Gothic glory, and there in the middle of it was Ashleigh, standing with a boy and a girl in the St. Jude’s dark-green uniform with the gold braided edging.
The school crest was visible on their blazer pockets.
They were laughing and talking to a woman who looked very Jackie O, reed thin and head to toe in navy.
It was curious and fascinating to observe this snapshot of her sister in a setting that was unfamiliar, with people Remy had never seen before.
Ashleigh: her identical twin, two halves of one egg, yet never had she felt more separate, further away than she did in that moment.
This was the time when the penny dropped.
Not when they had trawled around the school outfitters’ buying the long list of uniform that was compulsory for her sister’s first term at St. Jude’s.
Not when Ashleigh announced a boy in her class was having a birthday party and she was invited, and his parents were taking the whole class to see the movie Jaws in London, where they were to travel by luxury coach, followed by a slap-up meal in a swanky restaurant – the whole class!
And not when Ashleigh started to add the words, ‘Okay, so . . .’ at the beginning of her sentences with a slight drawl.
Not when the summer break arrived and Ashleigh told her about the trips her classmates would take to Provence and Tuscany, while the Bretts set off on a camping trip to North Wales with the Swingball safely secured on the roof of their dad’s car.
Not when her sister called on the phone and sounded more like Princess Anne than her sister.
Not even on that day when Ashleigh had announced that she would like to move into the small room, the box room, the room that had lain in wait for one of them to make the break.
No, it was now, as her sister stood in the quadrangle with strangers who were not strange to her: this was the moment when Remy realised they had indeed taken different paths, were on different tracks and were heading to very different destinations.
One to Sardinia, one to Southend . . . One in a Granada, one on a bus . . . One running her own business, the other emptying bins . . .
She would have laughed had she not been forced to swallow her tears, as the realisation struck her in the chest like an ice pick and hurt just about as much.
The hardest thing to fathom was that she had done this – she had put her sister in this uniform, set her on this path!
Remy might think her sister was an arsehole a lot of the time, but how she missed her.
‘Look at her, Dennis!’ Her mum put her free hand at her throat and spoke with thinly disguised emotion as they stared at her twin, framed by the view.
‘I know, Ruthie, I know . . .’ He patted her arm, and she watched the two grow inches in height and stature.
Ashleigh
Ashleigh smiled and nodded, as polite chit-chat was swapped between Harry, Jacinta, and Jacinta’s mother.
She spied her family through the arch and watched as they stopped and stared.
Her mum was dressed so brightly she felt the flicker of embarrassment, followed by a sharp jab of guilt at having momentarily wished her mother were more like the other mothers, demure and calm, before remembering that Jacinta had doubted her own mother would come at all, and Harry’s mum was more interested in money and property than her kids.
Her mum, she knew, would put her and Remy first in every situation, and always had.
She lifted her hand in a small wave. It felt a lot like giving them permission to proceed.
They walked slowly forward, as if wary of interrupting, and her heart ached for them, wanting them not to feel so self-conscious and to enjoy the day they had been talking about ever since the gold-rimmed, stiff-card, crested invitation had arrived and been propped on the sideboard in pride of place.
Remy, she noticed, was unusually ill at ease, her hands clasped awkwardly in front of her.
No doubt because she was wearing the awful kilt they’d both been kitted out in for Cousin Sian’s wedding.
It had been bad enough to be both wearing it when they could take solace from the other’s discomfort, revelling in a kind of mutual despair that had been almost comical, but to wear it alone!
It was like turning up to a fancy-dress party to find yourself the only one in costume.
‘Goodness!’ Mrs Wentworth gasped as she turned and spied Ruthie and Dennis Brett walking towards them.
Ashleigh didn’t have time to fully interpret the one word, but instinct told her it was unkind, mean, and for that reason alone she felt nothing but hatred for the woman in blue.
No wonder Mr Wentworth liked to jet off to Hong Kong.
‘Hello, darlin’!’ Ruthie trotted the last few feet and wrapped her in the kind of hug that was more appropriate for long-awaited reunions and gave no indication that she had seen her daughter only hours before at the breakfast table.
‘Hi, Mum! Dad! Rem!’
‘Well, this really is something. Bit different from my old school, I can tell you.’ Her dad put his head back and surveyed the architecture of the quad, taking in the walled recesses which held statues of Greek and Roman gods, all in a state of undress.
‘I’m Jacinta’s mother, Tuppence Wentworth.’
Tuppence? She exchanged a brief but meaningful glance with Remy, knowing without a doubt that like her she wanted to burst out laughing and holler, Tuppence?
What kind of a name is that? It was the way with twins, the understanding, the closeness, and she was glad of the reminder.
It warmed her. Everything always felt a little bit better when Remy was close by.
The earlier feeling of being in freefall faded and, in its place, a small rise of confidence.
‘Oh, yes, how rude of me, sorry!’ Her dad stuck out his hand and shook Tuppence Wentworth’s with enthusiasm. ‘I’m Dennis, and this is my wife, Ruthie.’
‘Hello!’ Her mum waved rather than shake hands, and Ashleigh felt her heart flex with love for her mother.
‘I so enjoy speech day. Our eldest son was here. He’s now at Brasenose, studying law.’
‘How clever. You must be very proud.’ Ruthie spoke with genuine awe, and Ashleigh wondered how often Tuppence said the words Brasenose and law on an average day. ‘This is our other daughter, Remy.’
‘Hi.’ Remy took a small step forward and kept her eyes on the floor.
‘Twins!’ Jacinta called out, as if she might be the only one to notice.
‘Yep.’ Remy gave her a double thumbs-up.
‘And where are you at school, dear?’ Mrs Wentworth asked.
‘I’m at Milton Road Comprehensive.’ This time Remy looked up and held the woman’s eyeline.
‘Oh!’ Again Tuppence offered one word that was so much more than the sum of its parts.
‘Remy’s the clever one,’ Ashleigh stated.
‘I see.’ Ashleigh knew Mrs Wentworth did not see, not at all. How could she?
‘We were just talking about what these youngsters might do when they leave St. Jude’s.
We’ve told Jacinta it’s law and Oxbridge or don’t come home!
’ There it was again, that silent laugh.
‘What would you like to do, dear?’ She addressed her sister directly.
Ashleigh wondered if the woman had a secret hankering to be a careers advisor, she seemed so desperately interested in everyone’s future plans.
Remy answered without missing a beat. ‘What I’d like to do is sit on a beach and read, but what I’ll probably do is work on the bins and go on holiday to Southend, if I can find the bus stop.’
Harry laughed loudly. Mrs Wentworth opened her mouth like a fish looking for krill, and her parents coughed and tutted to hide their embarrassment.
‘I guess one good thing’ – Ashleigh pointed out the obvious – ‘is that if you’re working on the bins, you can throw that kilt away easily.’
‘Very good point!’ Remy smiled at her, and it felt like a moment of healing, of connection, unified against the rather unpleasant Mrs Wentworth.
‘I don’t know what I want to do when I leave school’ – Ashleigh spoke now with certainty – ‘but I know it won’t be law or medicine. Maybe English or history, and then, who knows!’ She shrugged, almost excited by the prospect.
‘Would anyone like a Mint Imperial?’ Ashleigh watched as her mum ferreted in her handbag for the small white paper bag that bulged with the little sweeties, anything to change the subject, as if aware that neither her husband nor she wanted to hear their daughter’s plans not to become a doctor or a lawyer.
‘Ooh, smashing!’ Her dad placed his fingers in the bag and came out with not one but two sweets. Harry too took advantage of the offer. Jacinta and her mother both politely declined, Mrs Wentworth with a look of mild disgust on her thin lips.
‘So, what would you like to see first?’ Ashleigh smiled at her parents, wondering where to direct them.
‘Tell you the truth, I’d quite like to go back to the car park and look at some of them motors!’
Harry’s face lit up. ‘An American boy in the year above us, his father has a Jensen Interceptor, 7.2 litre engine, V8, convertible.’
‘Cor, I’d love to see that!’
‘Not sure if it’s there, but we can go and look around.’
She watched as her lovely dad wandered off with Harry, the boy whose own father was locked in a messy divorce.
‘What about you, Mum?’
‘I really don’t mind.’ Ruthie clutched her bag to her chest.
‘Tell you what.’ Remy took her mother’s arm, and Ashleigh was glad her sister was there to look after her. ‘Why don’t we have a mooch and see where we end up?’
Ashleigh smiled, watching as they ambled towards the art block, her sister pulling at the hem of that hideous kilt and her mother glowing like a neon bouquet against the brickwork.
It was typical of Remy, happy to wander without a plan, content to see where she might end up . . . and in that regard, Ashleigh could only envy her.