Chapter 8
On Saturday morning I hear my mum arrive before I see her. She has the kind of voice that carries. She’s nosy and will talk to anyone so I’m not surprised when I hear her chatting to someone outside.
I’m in the living room brushing Phoenix’s fur from the sofa – my mum has a million dogs yet there is never a hair to be found in her immaculate cottage.
I peer through the living-room window. Oh, God, she’s talking to Henry.
She’s become all flustered and high-pitched.
Marielle is nowhere to be seen. I’m going to have to rescue him – he’ll be there all day otherwise.
Leaving the front door on the latch, I step outside.
Mum is practically leaning over the Morgans’ wall to talk to Henry.
Her sunglasses are pushed back onto her still-dark curls and she is wearing a pretty floral blouse and white capri pants.
Henry has a watering can in his hand, which hangs uselessly by his side, and he’s nodding politely as Mum natters away.
‘Oh, there she is,’ Mum cries, when she sees me. ‘You never said you had new neighbours, Lena.’
My toes retract in my sandals and Henry gives me a half-smile. It’s the first time we’ve met since I think he might have seen me with Rufus’s boom mic in the garden.
‘Aren’t you going to help me with my case?
’ She directs this at me, but Henry jumps to attention, swiftly moves out of the gate and is taking it from her while she’s laughing and saying, ‘Oh, I didn’t mean you, but thank you.
’ I go to take the case from Henry but he insists and follows me inside the house, Mum keeping up a running commentary on the trains and the walk from the station in the heat.
I’d offered to pick her up from Temple Meads but she’d refused.
Henry stands awkwardly in my hallway, still clutching the handle of my mum’s yellow suitcase. It feels strange having him here.
‘You must stay for a cup of tea,’ insists Mum.
‘Just leave the case there. Lena will take it upstairs for me in a bit, won’t you, sweetheart?
’ She doesn’t wait for me to answer as she frogmarches Henry down the hallway and into the kitchen.
I wonder what he makes of it compared to his.
The cream cabinets are chipped, and the walls need repainting.
I had a nose on Rightmove when the developers put next door up for sale and the kitchen had looked spectacular with its glass extension, expensive mink-coloured units, marble work surfaces and pale oak floors.
Poor Henry looks completely bamboozled by my mother as he sits at my old oak table while she rushes around after him making tea – as if this is her house, not mine.
He laughs at some of the things she says as she chatters on to him, takes the tea and sips it.
He’s wearing chino shorts, a short-sleeved shirt, blue-and-white boat shoes, and looks the picture of respectability and class. Everything my mum admires in a person.
I notice the boom microphone and tape deck propped up in the corner and my heart drops. Henry doesn’t appear to have spotted them, thank goodness. His attention is taken up with Mum.
‘So, Henry,’ she says, pulling out a chair so she’s sitting next to him, ‘what brings you to Bristol? You don’t sound like you’re from the West Country.’
‘His grandson is here, Mum,’ I say, moving past them to open the patio doors. It’s stifling in the kitchen and there is no air, even with the doors open, but I’m also hoping to obscure Rufus’s recording equipment. I can smell Henry’s aftershave, something expensive and musky.
‘Oh, how lovely. How old?’ Mum asks Henry, ignoring me.
‘I … um, a few weeks, I think,’ he says, with a frown, while I pour myself a glass of water.
Mum shuffles in her seat. ‘Where are you from?’
‘All over. I grew up in Hampshire. Moved to London. We lived in Scotland for a bit.’ He sips his tea. Mum has put too much milk in it, but Henry doesn’t complain.
She looks as if she’s about to ask another question when her eyes go to the tape deck and microphone. ‘What on earth is all that?’
Henry follows her line of sight, and frowns.
Damn it.
‘Oh, that’s Rufus’s college equipment.’
‘Why the huge microphone?’ Mum asks. ‘What is he planning to do with that?’
‘He’s just gathering background sound for his project …’ I surreptitiously glance at Henry. His face is expressionless.
Mum laughs and turns to Henry. ‘My grandson thinks he’s Steven Scorsese,’ she says.
‘Steven Spielberg, Mum,’ I say. ‘Or Martin Scorsese.’
Henry looks up at me, mug in hand. ‘I’ve seen you and your son in the garden with it,’ he says mildly, with no apparent edge to his tone, but my stomach flips anyway.
‘It’s very old equipment. It doesn’t pick up much. We managed to get an owl hooting but that’s about all.’ I laugh, but it sounds forced.
Henry puts down his mug with a small smile. ‘Thanks so much for the tea. I’d better get back or Marielle will wonder where I am.’ He stands up. ‘It was lovely to meet you, er …’ He glances at my mum.
‘Bess. Are you sure? You’ve not finished your tea.’
‘I’d love to stay longer but I promised I’d take Marielle to the garden centre.’ He smiles charmingly at Mum.
She leaps up to trot after him and doesn’t come back in for another ten minutes. I dread to think what other information she’s prying from him. Mum has been known to extract all sorts from strangers, anything from their sex lives to whom they’ve fallen out with.
When she comes back she looks a little ruffled. ‘Such lovely people!’
‘You met Marielle too?’
‘She was in their front garden. What an immaculately turned-out woman. She was a lecturer at some fancy London university, and he was a neurosurgeon. He went to Cambridge. So clever! They have lovely accents, don’t they?
Very well spoken. They still have a flat in London.
And a country pad in the Cotswolds. Old money.
You can tell.’ She dusts down her trousers. ‘Anyway, where’s Rufus?’
‘Oh, so you’ve noticed your grandson isn’t here?’
She shakes her head at me in mock exasperation. ‘Of course.’
‘I thought you were too dazzled by Henry Morgan to notice anything else,’ I tease.
‘Oh, stop it.’ She hides a giggle behind her hand. ‘But he’s handsome, isn’t he? Very debonair. Like Sean Connery.’
‘Mum! He looks nothing like Sean Connery!’
‘Okay, maybe a taller Paul Newman then.’ She bends down to stroke Phoenix, who is nuzzling her leg. ‘So where’s my grandson?’
‘At Charlie’s.’ I glance at the clock. It’s nearly lunchtime.
‘He’ll be back in a minute.’ I’d checked Find My Phone and he was only around the corner.
Jo thinks that now Rufus is seventeen I shouldn’t be tracking him any more.
But I can’t help it. I like to know where he is when he’s not at home.
It’s always so reassuring to see that he’s arrived at his destination safely.
Rufus had called me while I was at work yesterday, asking if he could spend another night at Charlie’s because one of his friends was having a party not far away.
I’d been almost winded with disappointment, not to mention terror at having to spend another night alone.
I’d hardly slept, waking up at every creak coming from the house, although thankfully there were no repeats of Thursday night.
I’m exhausted today and so relieved that the house will be full tonight.
As if on cue I hear the key in the lock and Rufus saunters in.
His mass of sandy hair, just like Charlie’s, is dishevelled and he looks as though he’s slept in his clothes.
My heart soars at the sight of him and sinks when he’s followed by Charlie.
Why is he here? He hasn’t set foot in the house since he left.
The living room still looks bare since he took out his huge speakers and sound system, and the study at the foot of the stairs was where he kept his drum kit but now houses only Rufus’s guitar.
Mum, who has barely sat down, jumps up again to give Rufus a hug, and then Charlie. I try not to feel offended that she hasn’t hugged me since she arrived.
For a few seconds everything feels like it used to: this time last year we might have gone for a pub lunch.
We might have sat outside, at that nice place in Clifton Village, filling up on artisan bread.
Charlie would have had a lager, Rufus the fish and chips, his favourite, Mum the Welsh rarebit and a glass of wine. Things can change so much in a year.
‘How did you get on last night? Was the party fun? And how was the gig on Thursday?’ I ask, hugging Rufus and avoiding Charlie’s gaze. ‘Was it good?’
‘Yep,’ he replies, opening the fridge and sticking his head inside.
‘Meet anyone new at the party? Any nice girls?’
‘Nope.’ And that’s all I’ll get out of him as he removes a packet of pre-cooked mini sausages and starts stuffing them into his mouth.
Maybe, now he’s older, he feels more comfortable talking to Charlie about this kind of stuff.
I’ve always been over-involved. Charlie once called me a ‘mama bear’ and he didn’t mean it as a compliment.
I do find it hard to listen to reason when it comes to Rufus because my instinct is always to fight hard for him in a way my mum never did for me.
I still remember how she reacted when I left my midwifery course.
And then, later, when I moved to Bristol. She was never on my side.
‘Goodness, Charlie, don’t you feed the child?’ Mum asks.
Charlie shrugs. ‘You know what he’s like. I don’t know where he puts it.’ Then he catches my eye. ‘I … er … was wondering if I could have a quick word, Lena?’ His gaze goes to my mum and then back to me. ‘In private?’
Mum looks mildly offended but starts fussing around Rufus so I lead Charlie into the living room.
‘I like what you’ve done in here,’ he says, taking in the newly painted pale pink walls and new velvet cushions. ‘Very … minimalist.’