Chapter 2
2
When I woke up, my first thought was one of excitement – it was, after all, Christmas Eve and John and his family would be arriving later. A split second later I remembered Sara and her daughters were already in the house, under a significant cloud.
I got out of bed, showered, and dressed faster than I usually did, in the hope that by the time they came downstairs, I would have had time to clear away any overlooked debris from the previous night, set the table for breakfast, and done some preparations for the day ahead. I wanted to make everything perfect for them. To show them that I was managing now, that I could cope.
They had seen me through the months after Stephen had gone when I had just sat looking bleakly into the future, crying, angry, and frightened. Vanessa no longer had to organise a rota so that someone came over every few days with a casserole or flowers as they used to, back when I had been torn between relief that I didn’t have to spend another day alone and embarrassed that I was so pathetic.
Five years ago, Stephen had decided that we should move to a house with a smaller garden because ours was getting a bit big for me to handle and heaven forbid, he would ever help me. To get the ball rolling, Stephen had produced Gillian, an estate agent, to come around and value our place. She was a middle-aged, horse-faced woman who wore tweed and was a member of a local, titled family who had tenants in cottages, nannies and shooting parties. She had the unmistakeable air of landed gentry about her which was catnip to a snob like Stephen. Seven months later he had moved out to live with her in some Cotswold manor house with positively acres of garden and we had divorced. In our settlement, I kept the family home, Sara and John had warned their father it was non-negotiable and for once he had listened.
I read an article about such things in the paper only recently: ‘Silver Splitters’, we were called. Sixty-year-olds who, having weathered the decades of struggle with jobs, children, mortgages, health issues and looming infirmity, made one last break for the sunny uplands of freedom or romance. I hadn’t seen Stephen for a long time after the divorce was finalised and Sara and John didn’t enlighten me, but I could only assume he had found what he was looking for. Which essentially was a wife with money.
Anyway, that morning it seemed a hungover daughter and her two teenage girls were able to sleep far longer than I could.
Ten thirty came, and I had tidied up the discarded cardigans, handbags, lip glosses and teen magazines. The Christmas tree lights were on as well as all the battery-operated candles because Vanessa said burning real ones was eco-unfriendly and also detrimental to her children’s health, and there was still no sign of anyone.
Never mind, Christmas is a time when there is always a lot to do, and I set to trimming and preparing all the sprouts, wrapping two million sausages in streaky bacon, peeling potatoes, scraping carrots and generally behaving like Mary Berry ‘ getting ahead’ for the following day. I began to feel on top of things again. I had an important role to play, and I was going to do it flawlessly. I wanted to show them and myself that I was moving forward with my life.
I had already constructed a lasagne for that evening’s dinner, and I whipped up some garlic butter ready to plaster onto the French sticks I had bought the previous day. They were – as is the way of French bread – by now slightly stale. Why is that? I really should find out when an English loaf lasts for days. No wonder the French are always off to the boulangerie.
At eleven o’clock I wiped down the worktops again and went into the hall to listen for any sounds or signs of movement from upstairs. There were none. I polished the dining room table and dusted the sideboard although they didn’t really need it.
Then I began to worry. John and Vanessa were due to arrive for (decaffeinated) coffee soon. Why do people drink it? I thought caffeine was the whole point of coffee. I’d already set out the tray and arranged the (ordinary plus gluten free) mince pies on a Christmas specific plate decorated with snowmen.
What if Sara was unwell, or perhaps had done something silly? What that would be I wasn’t sure, an overdose of multivitamins? There was only a shower in her ensuite so she could hardly drown herself in the bath.
I hesitated, my foot on the bottom stair and then I heard a muffled thud and an annoyed scream, which I think must have come from the girls’ room. So, she hadn’t smothered her daughters in the night. Actually, at fourteen, Poppy and Mia were already as tall as Sara and having been to after school rugby and football clubs since they were seven, more than strong enough to compete against a gin-weakened mother.
‘Breakfast anyone?’ I shouted up the stairs and went back to the kitchen where my mobile phone was vibrating its way off the table.
‘ Joyeux Réveillon de No?l, ma soeur! Merry Christmas Eve! Joy to the world!’ Isabel shouted down the phone, repeating the usual Christmas pun. It was almost as though she was in the next room, and for a moment I wished that she was. ‘You should have been here last night; we had an absolute blast. Is everything okay your side of the Channel?’
‘Merry Christmas! I would have rung you, but by the time I got to bed it was nearly midnight. Things went a bit crazy here. Sara and the girls arrived a day early, without Marty,’ I said.
‘No surprise there then. As he told me last time I saw him, the city and money wait for no one,’ Isabel said.
‘Bit different this time. He’s gone to Zurich with his secretary for Christmas. Sara found out they were having an affair. Everything has gone to rat poo, and the three of them still aren’t up. Although I did hear the first scream of the morning from the girls, so perhaps they are on the move.’
Isabel gasped and then made a dismissive noise. ‘Poor Sara, but I can’t say I’m surprised. Marty never could speak to any woman without being a bit creepy. All that back rubbing and patting. So, what’s she going to do?’
I pulled out a chair and sat down. ‘Don’t know. She self-medicated with gin last night and did a lot of crying and threatening. Perhaps this morning she’ll be too hungover to do much. I’ve hidden her car keys.’
‘Very sensible. We had such a great evening; I wish you’d been there. I made Felix shut the bookshop early and everyone came round here. Remember that Christmas when you came and stayed with me? It was like that, but more so. Pierre had found an accordion somewhere, it was awful. I was nearly sick laughing.’
I felt quite sentimental for a few minutes, thinking back to the Christmas when I had been with her in Brittany, the first one after Stephen left, in her chaotic, rambling farmhouse, with dogs asleep under the kitchen table, people everywhere, bottles of wine circulating the room and platters of charcuterie.
It all felt very different from the Christmas that was unfolding in my house. Certainly, much noisier. But then I was beginning to realise there’s a difference between the noises of a lot of people laughing and enjoying themselves over a few glasses of wine, and the continuous racket of back chat, arguments and occasionally screaming that had been my soundtrack so far this Christmas.
‘Sounds fun,’ I said wistfully, ‘still, John and Vanessa will be arriving later, perhaps that will cheer everyone up.’
‘At least Sara’s twins will have someone else to squabble with,’ Isabel said, ‘unless they have grown out of that? And perhaps they will try to be a bit more tactful, things being what they are?’
I sighed. ‘I doubt it. Mia asked if she would now be getting two lots of Christmas and birthday presents like her friends do, and Poppy was nagging about a school trip to Barcelona. Not exactly tactful. Anyway, tell me what you are doing today, so I can think about something else.’
‘I would come to you and give you some moral support, except Felix has promised to put the Christmas tree up today, then this evening there is the special Christmas Eve meal, Le Réveillon , so I’ll have to do all the preparation for that. Pierre and Sylveste are coming round, plus their girlfriends, and Felix’s mother will come up the lane from her cottage, and a few friends from the town will probably turn up. Then Midnight Mass if we can still walk in a straight line. I have to roast some beef and a goose, make the dauphinoise potatoes, slice the smoked salmon, make the B?che de No?l , which is basically a glorified Swiss roll, prep the vegetables. It will be chaos. We are supposed to be eating at eight, the way things are going it will be closer to ten. Felix’s mother Eugénie will be tutting and interfering, the boys’ girlfriends will want to ‘help’ so you know what that means. So pretty much the same as you do tomorrow.’
‘I don’t think it will be the same at all,’ I said, feeling rather wistful.
‘Well, you are coming to me after they all leave, aren’t you? That’s what we agreed. Focus on that.’
‘Yes, that sounds like just what I need. Hang on, I can hear a car. I think it must be John. He’s early, too, I hope there are no disasters there.’
‘There won’t be. Have a fabulous time,’ my sister said, ‘don’t let Sara’s bombshell spoil things for you all. Being with her family might be just the lift she needs. And John will be around to help with things; he’s always been so capable. I’d better go, too, Felix is back with the salmon knife; he’s been sharpening it out in the workshop so it will be like a razor.’
It was true, I thought as I went to open the front door, John might not be much good at simple maths, but he had been an absolute rock. He had done so much to help when his father had left, he had worked methodically and patiently through all the paperwork and officialdom, I don’t know how I would have coped without him. And despite their argumentative childhood, I liked to think he and Sara were getting closer as they aged.
‘Mum! Merry Christmas!’ he said as he came inside to hug me. ‘You’re looking great!’
I looked down at my work-stained apron and ran one hand through my hair to try and bring order to chaos. My hair used to be quite well-behaved, whereas at sixty-three it seemed to have taken on a new, less controlled personality.
‘I think you’re being kind,’ I said.
John’s wife, Vanessa, was shepherding their daughters up the drive and gave me a little wave and a smile. Even muffled up in a thick coat and scarf, she looked thinner than ever.
‘Merry Christmas, Joy,’ she said, sounding exhausted already although they had only had a twenty-five minute journey to get to my house. ‘I see Sara’s here already.’
‘Tiny bit of a problem in that department. Let’s get you all settled and I’ll explain,’ I said.
The next hour was taken up with bringing bags and suitcases into the house, settling Bunny and Jasmine into the attic room with Mia and Poppy, and then ignoring their wary looks at each other as the boundary lines were drawn up and new hairstyles were scrutinised, we gathered in the kitchen.
‘So, no Marty,’ John said as he messed around with the coffee machine.
Sara lifted her chin. ‘No Marty,’ she said, ‘not now, not ever.’
‘So apart from anything else, no more of him trying to explain the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method when he obviously doesn’t know one end of a cricket bat from another. Good,’ John replied, ‘good riddance.’
Vanessa, sitting neatly at the kitchen table ducked her head and gave a little gasp.
‘Well, I’m glad you can see something to be positive about,’ Sara said, ‘I’m devastated and so are the twins.’
‘It’ll be fine,’ John said, ‘when you get used to the idea.’
Sara stifled a sob and ran out of the kitchen and into the living room where she could be heard noisily crying for a few seconds, until Vanessa went in to her with a box of tissues.
‘Still taking the tactful tablets, John,’ I said. ‘Can’t you see how unhappy she is? She’s barely stopped crying since she got here. I was hoping you would be helpful.’
John sighed. ‘Okay, I’ll apologise, but I can’t say I’m sorry about Marty when I’m not. He was always so pompous and such a show off.’
We sat and had coffee and then Vanessa and Sara returned, Sara looking particularly tragic and red-eyed.
‘Sorry, Sara,’ John said.
‘I know you never liked him. I know he didn’t really fit in,’ Sara replied, ‘I’m just so…’
She grabbed for another handful of tissues and gulped and sniffed for a bit while Vanessa rearranged the mince pies on the snowman plate so that the gluten free ones didn’t touch the ordinary ones. Perhaps she thought that the gluten would leap across and contaminate the whole lot?
We spent the rest of the morning chatting while I prepared lunch, and tiptoeing around Sara as though she was an unexploded bomb. The four girls eventually came downstairs looking sulky because there wasn’t a television in their room, and apparently Jasmine had some new Converse trainers that had been pronounced lame by Poppy and Mia. I wouldn’t have said there was a proper, Yuletide spirit in the house, which was, at best, disappointing.
Dinner that night was the lasagne, garlic bread and a salad. Jasmine immediately declared that she was ‘ thinking about becoming a vegetarian’ and leaned away from the bubbling dish as though it was radioactive. This unfortunately started an ill-informed discussion about the evils of meat in general and factory farming, which caused the other three girls to stare at me as though I had proudly produced a vat of botulism and unimaginable suffering covered in cheese sauce.
I thought about the turkey resting peacefully in its bath in the pantry and wondered what sort of reaction that would produce. Perhaps I should increase the volume of vegetables I was planning to serve the following day?
At last, the four girls slunk off from their unsatisfactory meal and into the sitting room where they could watch some reality show Christmas special and eat Celebrations, and I got out the liqueur glasses and the first bottle of Baileys.
‘I have an announcement,’ John said at last.
I knew there was something, he’d dropped enough hints over the last week. Was Vanessa pregnant again? Looking at her sitting next to me in her size six jeans and miniscule sweater, it didn’t seem likely.
‘That’s exciting,’ I said encouragingly.
‘Well, it’s been on the cards for a while now, but it’s official. We are moving,’ John said.
Across the table Vanessa smiled, a flush of colour coming to her cheeks.
‘I didn’t know your house was on the market,’ I said.
‘It’s not,’ Vanessa said, ‘we’re going to rent it out.’
‘So where are you going?’ I asked, rather puzzled.
John took a deep breath, trying to hide the grin that was spreading over his face.
‘New York.’
I gasped, not quite able to process this information for a few seconds.
New York. But that was America. The other side of the Atlantic. I felt a bit sick for a moment.
‘New York, America?’ I said at last, rather foolishly.
‘That’s the one,’ John said, evidently very pleased about this, ‘for two years. Maybe longer. I didn’t like to say anything before now in case it all came to nothing, but this promotion has been on the cards for six months and they’ve been asking me to go for a while, and now it’s all fallen into place.’
‘We’re very excited,’ Vanessa said, her blue eyes wide, ‘we wanted to tell you first, but the girls will be thrilled when we tell them.’
‘You’re all going?’ I said, my mouth dry.
The lasagne suddenly sat like a stone in my stomach.
She nodded. ‘Absolutely. The company have fixed us up with an apartment to start with, and suggested schools for the girls. And when we are settled, we can look around for a house, it’s going to be so broadening for them, to see more of the world, other cultures, and customs.’
‘Yes, I suppose so,’ I said faintly.
‘It’s a bit of a shock, isn’t it, Mum?’ John said. ‘Perhaps you can come out and visit us?’
‘I knew it! I said you’d have something to brag about,’ Sara said furiously, slamming her napkin down on the table. ‘Big promotion, big new life, big everything! Just when my life is falling to pieces!’
‘That’s a bit unfair,’ I said. ‘Congratulations, John. I’m sure we are all delighted for you.’
Was I happy? I suppose I was pleased for them, for him. He had done so well, but America. It was so far away.
Sara took her glass, downed the Baileys in one and reached for the bottle.
‘You could come and visit us too,’ Vanessa said.
‘Oh yes, I can just see me springing for airfares when the girls and I will be living in some squalid flat somewhere while Marty moves his bit of stuff into my house.’
I think Sara had been knocking back the Pinot Grigio during the meal with more enthusiasm than any of us realised.
‘I’m sure you’re wrong. Perhaps Marty will be the one to move out,’ I said, ‘and you and the girls can stay where you are. After all he is the one who has caused all this.’
Sara scowled, looking exactly as she had when she was thirteen and been refused permission to go out with her friends on a school night.
‘You don’t think I’m going to stay there, knowing what those two have been up to? In my bed!’
I glanced across at John and we exchanged a look.
‘You need to take it one step at a time. Go and see a solicitor after Christmas, find out the best plan of action,’ he said, ‘I’m sure?—’
‘Oh, what would you know about it? With your perfect life, your perfect wife,’ Sara spat back.
‘No need to be like that,’ he replied evenly.
‘Well, you tell me then John, the golden boy who couldn’t tie his shoelaces until he was eleven, how should I be?’
The door to the dining room burst open and Mia came in her expression thunderous.
‘Mum, tell her. Bunny is being mean. She says my hair looks stupid and she says Poppy won’t ever get a boyfriend. And Poppy said Bunny was a silly cow, and then Jasmine started crying and she threw a cushion at Poppy and broke a vase, and there’s water all over the sofa. And Jasmine said it was my fault.’
We all got up and went to sort the chaos out. Sara doing her best but crying, Vanessa brisk and efficient, John trying to find out the true version of events and me going to get a cloth and the dustpan and brush.