Chapter SEVEN
ONE WEEK LATER, EVERYTHING WAS FINALLY UNPACKED AND MY father had made noticeable headway on the repairs. Even my mother seemed better. She’d assisted me enthusiastically with the unpacking, and after we were finished appeared to finally find herself a mission when she decided she was going to tackle the jungle of thistles that occupied our back garden. “I’m going to put in a lawn, and some nice flowering shrubs,” she said, gesturing with the massive tin of weedkiller my father had purchased for her on his way home from work.
The enormous “Poison” warning on the tin had made me a little nervous, and I’d questioned my father about the wisdom of allowing her access to several gallons of such a lethal substance. He jovially dismissed my concerns, telling me that she had obviously recovered and was now “right as rain.” Unconvinced by his confidence, I eyed the giant tin apprehensively as she swung it back and forth.
“I’m going to put a fishpond and a fountain in the back,” she continued describing her plans. “Maybe I’ll get some of those little garden gnomes to put around it. That’ll look nice, don’t you think?”
“Can we have pansies?” I asked, imagining their bright yellow and purple blooms placed at perfectly spaced intervals all around the garden.
“I suppose so. But, whatever I put in, I’ll have it looking lovely by next summer. We’ll be able to throw one of those posh garden parties.”
I couldn’t imagine who she thought was going to come to this party. The only guests I could envisage were Auntie Mabel, and, if he happened to be out of prison at the time, Uncle Ted. As she continued to talk, however, I realized that my mother seemed to have illusions of making friends with the local landed gentry, going on at length about how “you get a better class of people” in the countryside and how we could “improve our social standing” if only we played our cards right. My mother’s strategy in this regard seemed to be to impress them with her landscape-gardening talents and the Mr. Kipling cream cakes she’d serve with our afternoon tea.
“Sounds great, Mum,” I said.
“Yes, it does, doesn’t it?” she said, beaming as she unscrewed the cap of the weedkiller and strode purposefully toward the back door.
For the next week or so, my mother worked on the garden. Within days, she had reduced the thistles to a wilted, collapsed mass. After this, she talked my father into buying her a scythe. (He was a little more reluctant to purchase this particular item than the weedkiller and was persuaded to do so only after she threatened to march over to the nearest farm to ask if she could borrow one.) Scythe in hand, she began whacking away at the monstrous bramble bushes that bordered all sides of the garden. “Take care with that thing, Evelyn,” my father called to her, cringing as she swung it around her in wide, menacing arcs. I watched her from the kitchen window, her eyes bright, teeth clenched, and I was reminded of those medieval pictures I had seen in my history textbook of Death, the Grim Reaper, sweeping through Europe during the plague.
The day I’d met Tracey, she’d told me that she and her family were leaving for a fortnight’s holiday in Cornwall that weekend. I’d given her my telephone number, and I was thrilled when she rang the day after her return and invited me to meet up with her in the village the following morning. After we’d wandered around for a while and she’d told me about all the drop-dead-gorgeous boys she met while she was away, Tracey suggested that we go to her house and get something to eat.
“We can make some sandwiches and I can show you my David Cassidy posters,” she said, grinning.
“Great,” I said, trying to sound enthusiastic. During our first encounter, aside from talking about all the boys at school she liked, she had told me how, really, if she had a choice, she’d prefer to go out with David Cassidy. She also went on at great length about his looks, his songs, and how much she enjoyed watching episodes of The Partridge Family. I omitted to mention that I hated this particular television program and, though I knew there were boys who were far uglier than David Cassidy, I really hadn’t given him a second thought. But going over to Tracey’s house meant going back to Marigold Court, and I felt a flutter of excitement at the possibility of seeing Amanda again.
I hadn’t mentioned Amanda to Tracey, but I had been hoping to slip her name into the conversation, to inquire whether Tracey knew her and where she happened to live. For some reason, though, it seemed impossible to just mention Amanda casually. I was afraid I’d blush when I talked about her and Tracey would think I was odd. When we came to the street, however, it was just as quiet as it had been the first time I visited, and without seeing a single one of her neighbors we made our way into Tracey’s house.
Tracey’s mother was at home when we arrived. Slender and peachy-skinned, she wore an Alice in Wonderland headband to hold her straight blond hair out of her face, and a flowery ruffled smock.
“Hello, Tracey, love. Didn’t expect to see you back here so soon,” she said, her voice so soft and melodic that it made me realize how abrasive the tones of all my female relatives were. And while all the women in my family were big-limbed and hefty, Mrs. Grasby was thin, with small fine-boned hands and guarded, delicate gestures to match. I remembered that she was the president of the Bleakwick Young Wives Club. If all the other members were like that, I thought, no wonder my mother had been tossed out. “This must be your new friend,” she said, pressing her palms to each side of her face and regarding me as if I were a surprise gift that had just been delivered to her door.
“Her name’s Jesse,” Tracey said, rolling her eyes at me, apparently irked by her mother’s enthusiasm. “She moved into Johnson’s house. You know, that place on the road out of the village, the one that’s falling to bits.”
“Oh, Tracey, don’t be so rude,” her mother said, shaking her head and making a tut-tut sound with her tongue. “That’s not how we talk to guests, now is it?” She turned to me. “Don’t mind Tracey—she tends to forget her manners sometimes.”
Tracey rolled her eyes again. “We just came home for something to eat. I thought you were going out.”
“Oh, I was, but then I got carried away making that chicken casserole I saw in the new issue of Good Housekeeping. I thought your dad might want something different for a change. I think he’ll like it,” she said, pushing her hands into the ruffles of her smock. “At least I hope he likes it.” For a moment, her voice seemed to catch in her throat and her face pressed into an uneasy tightness, her mouth bracketed by two carved lines. Then, almost as fast it came, the expression was gone and she was all soft edges and smiles. “Why don’t you girls go and sit down and I’ll make you some sandwiches. Ham and tomato all right for you, Jesse?”
“Yes, please, Mrs. Grasby,” I said, following Tracey into the living room while her mother bustled down the hall toward the kitchen.
The furniture in Tracey’s living room was very much as I’d expected—a thick-piled fitted carpet, an unscratched coffee table and sideboard, a pristine settee and matching armchairs, porcelain ornaments on the windowsills. The only unexpected element was the glass cabinet in the corner filled with gilded plates, silver trophies, bronze cups, ribbons, and medallions, and a collection of photographs and certificates on the wall.
“I didn’t know your mum and dad did ballroom dancing,” I said, walking over to take a closer look at the photographs.
Tracey shrugged. “Yeah, that’s how they met.”
In the pictures, they were beautiful. Mrs. Grasby, her hair coiffed in elaborate, twisty piles, her body sheathed in sparkly, sequined gowns, looked glamorous. And Mr. Grasby was dark-featured and ruggedly handsome in a black suit, white shirt, and black bow tie, his hair slicked back and shiny as patent leather. Some of the photographs were posed, but most caught them in the exuberance of dancing—their bodies arced in elegant lines, heads tilted, faces shiny with perspiration and the brilliance of the ballroom’s lights. My eyes flitted from photograph to photograph, fascinated by the way, in those dancing shots, they cut such a dazzling spectacle, their two bodies converging in a single fluid motion, so that there was no doubt that they were meant to be together. I thought of my own parents, both terrible dancers in their own particular way: my father so robotically stiff that dancing hardly seemed the right word for the wooden movements of his limbs; my mother frenetic and out of sync with any rhythm in the music, making it obvious that in dancing, as in everything else, she occupied a world of her own.
For a moment, I felt such envy that it was a liquid filling me. Here was the neat little house I imagined for myself: a mother who baked casseroles, presided over the Young Wives, and looked glamorous on the dance floor; and a father who was good-looking and won trophies in the quickstep. It was all so perfect, so perfectly normal, that I wished that it were mine. Of course, I knew I couldn’t have it; I couldn’t step into Tracey’s life. But if I remained her friend, attached myself to all this perfection, perhaps I’d be able to shed my own aura of social failure and bask in Tracey’s glow.
“God,” Tracey huffed. “I’m bloody starving. Mum! Mum! Have you got them sandwiches made yet?” She pushed herself up from the settee and made for the door. “Come on, let’s see what’s taking her so bloody long.”
I followed her down the hall and into the kitchen, where her mother stood over the counter buttering slices of bread. Tracey walked over to her to look out the kitchen window. “Oh, God. What the bloody hell is she doing here?”
“Tracey,” her mother said, “there is no need for that language! And, anyway, don’t be like that. She’s your sister, for goodness’ sake.”
“Who?” I asked, walking closer to the window.
“Our bloody Amanda, that’s who.”
“Tracey!” Her mother exclaimed.
I leaned over the kitchen counter and, gripping its edge, peered through the window. The back garden was a square of lawn surrounded by a border filled with rosebushes, sweet peas, and geraniums. In the middle of the grass, on a vinyl sun bed, reading a book, lay the girl I had met outside the Co-op. Wearing the smallest bikini I had ever seen anywhere except, perhaps, on the girls who draped the beaches on Hawaii Five-O, her whole body was glossy with suntan lotion.
“You didn’t tell me you had a sister,” I said, turning to Tracey.
“Yeah, well, she’s horrible and I don’t like her. So I don’t talk about her much. All right?”
Mrs. Grasby looked at me and sighed. “They used to get along perfectly well. I suppose it’s a teenager thing. Do you have any sisters or brothers, Jesse?”
“No, it’s just me,” I answered.
“God, what I wouldn’t do to be an only child,” Tracey huffed. Then she stomped toward the back door, swung it open, and stalked into the garden. I followed close behind.
“What are you doing home?” she demanded, standing over Amanda, hands on hips. “First I find Mum at home and now you’re here as well. You told me you were going out.”
“What business is it of yours what I get up to?” Amanda said without lowering her book. It was a romance novel. “Now go along and play like a good little girl.”
“Oh, piss off, Amanda.”
“You piss off. Can’t I get even five minutes’ quiet?”
“God, anybody would think you were the queen of bloody everything the way you carry on. You said you were going out.”
“I changed my mind, didn’t I?” Amanda dropped her book to her lap. She was wearing sunglasses but pulled them off to give Tracey a challenging stare. Then she noticed me. “I know you,” she said, picking up the book again and waving it toward me so the pages flapped loose and open. “You’re the one I saw outside the Co-op a couple of weeks ago. The one that was all wet.”
“She’s my friend,” Tracey declared, as if she thought this was in jeopardy.
“Oh, don’t get your knickers in a knot,” Amanda responded. “She’s quite a laugh, this one. Got a good sense of humor. Maybe she’ll get you out of your permanent bloody bad mood. What’s your name again?”
“Jesse,” I answered.
“Right. Nice to see you again, Jesse.”
I wished that I could find something to say that would make my name, myself, as memorable as she was to me. “Did you have a nice time at the pictures with your boyfriend?” I finally asked, hating the feebleness of my question as soon as I uttered it.
“It was all right. Of course, all he wanted to do was snog in the back row,” she said, lowering her voice and looking toward the kitchen, where Mrs. Grasby was standing by the window assembling the sandwiches. “Me, I wanted to watch the film. Spent as much time fighting Stan off as that bloke in the film spends fighting that damn shark.” She laughed and tossed her book so that it fell, splayed open on the grass. Then she picked up the bottle of suntan lotion that sat next to her on the lawn, shook some of the brown liquid into her palm, and began to rub it on her neck. “Sometimes I think I should give up men altogether,” she said as she pulled down each of the straps of her bikini top to smear lotion on her shoulders. “Become a nun, go and live in a convent.”
“Really?” I asked.
“No, of course she’s not going to be a nun,” Tracey said. “They wouldn’t take her. She’s too much of a slag.”
“Yeah, well, takes one to know one,” Amanda said, scowling at Tracey. Then she looked at me again. “So what do you think I should do, Jesse? I do get sick of lads. They’re only after one thing, anyway. Don’t you think?”
“I, er, I don’t know,” I said, shuffling awkwardly on the grass.
Amanda laughed. “Yeah, well, keep it that way. Stay sweet and innocent for as long as you can.” She gave me a wink.
I felt color flood into my cheeks. I stood there wordless while Amanda squeezed lotion across the top of her breasts.
“Come on, Jesse,” Tracey said, grabbing my sleeve. “Who wants to listen to this rubbish? Let’s go and get a sandwich.” She tugged me toward the kitchen.
“Hey, Jesse, before Miss Nasty Knickers here drags you away …” Amanda waved her hand loosely in my direction.
Without thinking, I shrugged Tracey’s hand off me. “Yes?”
“I think I want to turn over—you know, get some sun on my back. Do you think you could rub some lotion on me?”
“Okay,” I answered, ignoring Tracey’s loud grunt, her stomping retreat toward the kitchen.
“I don’t know why you bother—you only burn,” Tracey called over her shoulder. “Got Irish skin, to match your Irish brain, haven’t you, Amanda? You’ll never get a tan, you’ll only end up red as a beetroot. Who knows, maybe Stan will finally realize how ugly you are, see some bloody sense, and dump you.” Then she marched through the door, slamming it behind her.
“Don’t take any notice of her. She’s only jealous.”
“Jealous?”
“Yeah, she doesn’t like it when I get on with her friends. She’s very possessive, is Tracey. And bossy, in case you hadn’t noticed. Of course, having an older sister makes it difficult for her. It’s not like I’m going to let her tell me what to do. Get more than enough of that from certain other people round here.” She paused and looked toward the house. Then she smiled up at me. “Now, can you make sure and do every inch of me? One thing Tracey’s right about is that I burn something terrible if I’m not careful.” Amanda eased herself over to lie on her stomach.
I picked up the bottle and poured out the lotion so that it pooled in my palm. Then I put my hand on Amanda’s shoulder and began rubbing it over her. The lotion was warm, warmer than her skin, and it seeped so easily into her flesh that I kept having to pour out more. I found myself fascinated with the way it oozed over her, following the curve of her spine, dripping down the valleys below her shoulder blades. It ran in little brown rivulets, washing over the tiny golden hairs that patterned her legs.
“You’ve got very soft hands, you know.” Amanda let out a long breath and shifted her hips sideways. “Hey, I’ll have to get you to come round and do this more often.” She laughed a soft throaty laugh.
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t think I could. My heart was beating too hard, thumping like an immense timpani drum against my chest. My throat felt dry, and though I was trying desperately to control them as they slid across Amanda’s slick and freckled skin, my fingers were trembling.
THAT EVENING, MY MOTHER announced that she needed a break from doing the garden. I had to admit that she’d made remarkable progress. After she’d hacked away the thistles and brambles, she telephoned a local nursery. The following day, a man had arrived with a petrol-powered rototiller in the back of his van, hauling it out to the driveway and providing my mother with detailed verbal instructions and a spare can of petrol before he drove away.
“Just don’t let her do anything stupid, will you, Jesse?” my father said as he eyed my mother pulling on the rototiller’s starter cord before he left for work.
“No, Dad,” I answered, imagining myself trying to prise my mother’s hands away from the machine’s handles if things went awry or throwing my body in its path if that strategy failed.
Fortunately, everything went smoothly and my mother worked until dusk, pushing the chortling machine back and forth, churning up the heavy dark clay. By Friday, she had mapped out a plan and begun digging the fishpond, which she had decided, along with a fountain surrounded by fishing gnomes, would form the centerpiece of her new garden.
“I’m jiggered,” she said, walking into the kitchen and throwing herself into one of the chairs. “I’m taking this weekend off. I thought we’d get your dad to take us to see Mabel on Saturday. What do you think about that?”
I was delighted at the idea, but I’d already made arrangements to meet Tracey. “I can’t, I’m seeing my friend. Tracey.”
“That’s all right,” my mother said breezily. “You can bring her with you.”
Hoping to prevent Tracey wanting to visit our house or meet my family, I’d told her that my mother had a very serious case of shingles and it was absolutely imperative that she remain in isolation until she had fully recovered. I had also told Tracey that that could take a very long time.
“What time are you meeting her?” my mother asked.
“Who?”
“Your friend, this Tracey.”
“Oh, I don’t remember.”
“Well, that’s not much good, is it? I mean, how are you going to meet her if you don’t know what time you’re supposed to be there?”
I shrugged. “I’ll probably remember by tomorrow. I’m not meeting her until tomorrow.”
“Does she have a phone?” my mother asked, pushing herself out of her chair and making her way toward the hallway, where our telephone sat buried under a sheet my father had put over it to protect it from the paint he’d been applying to the walls.
“I don’t remember.” I followed her into the hallway, panicking.
“What do you mean, you don’t remember? What’s wrong with you, anyway?” She pulled out the telephone directory. “What’s her name?” she asked, leafing through the directory’s flimsy pages.
“Tracey.”
“Look, madam, don’t you get funny with me. You know full well I mean what’s her surname. Here am I trying to do you a favor and invite your friend to come out with us for the day and there you are acting like a big useless dollop. Now, you’d better get some sense into yourself soon, miss, or I’ll be giving you the back of my hand to think about. Am I making myself clear?”
“Yes.”
“Good. So what’s her name?”
“It’s all right, Mum,” I said. “I’ll phone her.”
“Oh, so now you remember her number, then? God, you’re as bad as your father. You’d forget your own head if it wasn’t screwed on.” She picked up the phone and thrust it toward me.
I had been hoping that she would leave me alone to make my call, allowing me to make up an excuse to Tracey for not being able to meet her and afterward to report that, sadly, Tracey was unable to join us. This, however, was not to be, and with my mother standing over me I found myself inviting Tracey to accompany us on a visit to my Auntie Mabel’s. Despite my best attempts to make this outing sound like the dullest way to spend an afternoon, Tracey eagerly accepted the invitation.
“IF WE’RE GOING TO Mabel’s, then we’re going to visit my dad,” my father said as my mother announced the news of our impending journey later that evening. He was slapping pale blue paint onto one of the hallway walls and my mother had to stand well back to avoid being spattered. His own face was already covered in tiny speckles of blue, making him look as if he had some kind of strange skin ailment.
“Oh, no, we’re not! I’m not spending one minute with that miserable old bugger.”
My mother usually refused to accompany my father when he visited my grandfather. For as long as I could remember, she had never liked him. And, from what I had witnessed of their limited interactions, it was obvious the feeling was mutual.
“Well, in that case I’m not driving you to see your Mabel.” He said this somewhat gleefully, apparently enjoying the power he had as the only one who could drive. My mother had tried to learn. Indeed, she had taken the driving test six times but had failed to pass. It wasn’t clear if she would try again, since the last time she took the examination, over two years ago now, she drove through a red light, narrowly missing an elderly pedestrian but managing to broadside a Mini before finally coming to a stop when the car she was driving hit a lamppost. The last we’d heard, the poor examiner was still out on disability leave.
“If you don’t want to see my dad, you’ll have to take the bus,” my father concluded.
“But it takes forever.”
My father shrugged. “It’s up to you.”
“Oh, all right, then. But we’re only stopping for an hour and not a second longer, right, Jesse?”
I turned toward the stairs and the relative safety of my bedroom. I didn’t want to get involved in their argument. I was already dealing with enough anxiety thinking about dragging Tracey along on this excursion.