Chapter Twenty-Two #2
‘If you’re sure.’ Monica folded her hands in her ample lap. ‘I’m something of a film fan, especially the old classics, even back to the first silent films.’
Tamara always found it fascinating to see what emerged through their group discussions. The books they read were only a part of it and simply opened the door.
‘Believe it or not, the oldest film based on this wonderful book was made in 1901 and was called Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost. It’s obviously a silent film and only lasted a little over six minutes, and sadly about a minute of that has been lost over the years.
’ Monica perched on the edge of the chair.
‘Remember, Charles Dickens didn’t die until 1870, so people watching the film when it was released could’ve been old enough to remember the book being published.
They might even have heard Dickens read from the work publicly.
Isn’t that incredible? Oh, goodness, I could rattle on for ever about all this.
My poor husband tries to rein me in, but when I get started .
. .’ She took a breath. ‘Most film buffs consider the 1951 version starring Alastair Sim to be unrivalled. He brought Ebenezer Scrooge to life quite incredibly and it’s the best adaptation as far as staying true to the story.
It still makes people shiver, cry and laugh after all these years.
’ Monica sat back, pink with embarrassment.
‘I can’t believe I’ve come across another film aficionado.’ Ophelia’s eyes shone. ‘I became interested when I lived in France where it’s such an art form. I’m particularly fond of forties and fifties classics with the old stars like Brigitte Bardot, Alain Delon and Catherine Deneuve.’
Was it wishful thinking to believe Evelyn’s sister looked brighter tonight?
‘I love those too.’ Monica nodded enthusiastically. ‘Perhaps you’d care to come over for coffee one morning? We can happily bore each other talking about films, rather than all these dear people.’
‘I’d enjoy that very much, thank you.’
Tears pricked Tamara’s eyes to see the club working its magic again. She left them all talking and slipped out to put the mince pies and sausage rolls in the oven.
‘Anything I can do to help?’ Josie popped her head around the kitchen door.
‘You can put the kettle on.’
‘When are you and Pixie going to stop behaving like five-year-olds who’ve fallen out over a favourite doll?’
‘I’m not discussing that.’ Apart from Gage, no one knew the full story of why she’d thrown in her job and hadn’t ventured inside the pub since. ‘I’d rather talk about what you think we can do to help Melissa.’
‘Fine. Be that way.’
She busied herself fetching a selection of sparkling waters and fizzy drinks from the fridge and setting them on the countertop. ‘Melissa claims she’s not bothered about the baby thing, but I don’t believe it.’
‘Sometimes people find not facing up to the truth the only way of coping. I see it with patients all the time. The secret is trying to work out if they want to be pushed into it, or not.’
‘So, what’s your opinion in her case?’
‘Yeah, do share.’ Melissa marched in with eyes blazing and her American accent significantly stronger than usual. ‘Am I tonight’s group pity-project?’
‘It’s not pity and you know it.’ Josie sounded quite fierce. ‘We care about each other and if one of us is hurting, we all hurt. If we can help, that’s what we try to do. You know we share our joys too. The whole package.’
‘As I told Ms Nosey here—’ a dismissive nod came Tamara’s way — ‘I’ve absolutely accepted that it’s extremely unlikely Nathan and I will ever be parents.
He doesn’t seem able to do that.’ Melissa shook her head.
‘Ironic, isn’t it? I was the one full of having a baby in the first place, whereas he was happy either way.
That’s why I never mentioned the possibility of IVF, adoption or even surrogacy to him.
Now he doesn’t understand why I won’t consider either.
I simply want to enjoy the wonderful life we already have.
If a baby comes along, that’s great, but if not it’ll be fine.
I expect Chloe and Toby will have kids one day, so we can look forward to spoiling them instead.
’ Her smile was unnaturally bright. ‘By the time I come back from visiting my family, I hope he’ll be more .
. . accepting. Then we can move on together. ’
‘When are you going?’
‘In a couple of weeks. For Christmas.’
‘Without Nathan?’ Tamara couldn’t hide her dismay and Josie looked equally bamboozled.
‘We’re married. Not joined at the hip.’ Melissa bristled. ‘He’s fine with me going alone.’ She glanced at the food on the table. ‘I’ve lost my appetite, so I’ll leave y’all to dissect me over the mince pies.’ With that, she flounced out of the house.
‘I’d say we well and truly put our gigantic feet in it.’ Josie picked up the ladle and sloshed mulled wine into two red heatproof cardboard cups, then passed one to Tamara. ‘Drink that. There’s no way we can share this in front of Monica, so it’ll have to go around the phone tree later.’
They’d set up a cascading list for passing on critical group messages — more often than not, gossip they didn’t want the others to miss out on. The lines would burn up later.