The Sweetest Thing (5 page)

Anyway, later that night Adam went out with a friend, the girls were sleeping upstairs and David and I were enjoying a rare evening alone together. We sat side by side on the sofa – one of the sofas that’s under a tarpaulin in the barn right now – David picking at his dessert of zabaglione that I’d made to go with the biscuits. In spite of looking completely exhausted, he still managed to look as handsome as ever. Think Jude Law and you wouldn’t be far wrong.

‘Is there something wrong?’ I asked. ‘Don’t you like it?’ I went on.

‘No. I mean, yes. It’s great, Jennie. Right up to your usual standard.’ David put the plate down on the floor at his feet. ‘It’s me. I went out for lunch with a client. I’m not all that hungry.’

‘Never mind,’ I sighed, thinking that the children had enjoyed the biscuits at least.

‘You know, you ought to be able to find a market for your baking,’ he continued, his expression veiled in shadow as the tea lights burned down in the fireplace. ‘You’re an ace cook.’

Forgiving him for his lack of appetite, I cuddled up to him, but he didn’t respond.

‘I know you like being a stay-at-home mum, but perhaps you should think about setting up a business of some kind to keep you occupied and bring a little money in.’

‘David, don’t you think I’m occupied enough? I spend all day every day rushing about from one appointment to another, what with the school run, Sophie’s ballet and Georgia’s swimming, plus sorting Adam’s braces which seem to break every five minutes, as if I feed him on a diet of stones.’

‘You still seem to manage to fit in seeing your sister, your mum and your friends, along with trips to the hairdresser and the body shop.’

David was joking – he meant the beautician. And he wasn’t really complaining. He’d have had a fit if I’d turned up in bed with whiskers and hairy legs.

‘I thought we’d decided I wouldn’t rush into anything until Sophie started at secondary school?’ That was more than three years away. ‘I don’t need to. Do I?’ I added, uncertain now. ‘Is there some problem at work?’ There had been rumours of redundancies before now. ‘Are we in some kind of financial difficulty?’ And then I thought how ridiculous, how demeaning, it sounded to be asking that question. I was a grown woman, an adult, and once I’d known exactly how much money we had as a couple whereas lately I’d let things slide and now had absolutely no idea, except that there always seemed to be enough. Something I’m ashamed to say I’d taken for granted.

‘No, no problem,’ he said quickly. ‘I just thought … Well, sometimes it’s good to have interests outside the home, things to talk about.’

A sense of paranoia set in. I picked up a cushion and
hugged it to my chest. I should have let it go, ignored it, but I couldn’t.

‘Are you saying I’m boring then?’

‘No, not that.’

‘What then? Are you saying you’re bored with me?’ I looked at him, really looked at him, in a way that I hadn’t recently. In a sort of narrowed-eye, what-have-you-been-up-to-this-time? kind of way. He was wearing new socks. Ben Sherman. I didn’t buy them. He must have done. He never bought his own socks. Unless … My heart started to beat overly fast. ‘David?’

And then it all came out. I still can’t think about it now without welling up.

Anyway, when I was clearing away the remains of my marriage the next day, I noticed the biscuit broken in two on David’s plate and felt sick and sad, and knew in that instant that I’d never bake boudoir biscuits again.

‘Penny for them?’ Mum says, interrupting my thoughts.

I snap the recipe book shut.

‘It’s nothing,’ I say. ‘Shall I put the kettle on again?’

‘Use the one by the sink. I found it in the larder – it goes on the hotplate. The boiling not the simmering one. It’s all right, I’ve given it a good clean.’

The kettle is whistling when Adam arrives downstairs in shorts and T-shirt for second helpings of breakfast, grumbling that as well as there being no way he can contact his friends on Facebook, there’s not enough hot water to fill the bath. A few minutes later, Dad and the girls turn up with bags of provisions but no draining board. Sophie stomps in, stubs her toe on the raised edge of one of the flagstones and flies into a strop.

‘I’ve broken my toes,’ she cries.

‘Well, if you will wear flip-flops,’ I say. ‘I bought you a pair of summer shoes, remember.’

‘They’re so cool. Not,’ Sophie says, and I hear my mother’s sharp intake of breath.

‘When I was eight,’ she says, ‘the only pair of shoes I had was a pair of brown sandals with crepe soles which melted if you left them out in the sun. I didn’t make a fuss about wearing the latest fashion, or –’ she glances towards Adam who’s at the table scraping his plate clean ‘– designer labels.’

‘Were your parents very poor, Granny?’ Sophie asks.

‘They didn’t have a lot of money,’ Mum confirms.

‘Luckily, my daddy’s quite rich,’ Sophie says. ‘He and Alice take us clothes shopping when we stay with them, which is lucky for us because there aren’t any clothes shops for children in Talyton St George. There’s not even a Primark,’ she goes on, shaking her head sadly.

‘Never mind,’ I say lightly, wondering how I managed to bring up my children to be so materialistic. ‘You won’t die without one.’

‘She might die of embarrassment, if we’re lucky,’ Georgia cuts in. When I cast her a warning glance, she continues, ‘Well, she wouldn’t stop snoring last night. Even when I pinched her nose.’

‘You didn’t, Georgia?’ I say.

‘She did, Mummy,’ Sophie says, outraged. ‘I remember now, and it really hurts.’

‘It’ll take your mind off your broken toes,’ Adam points out. ‘Which aren’t broken by the way, because when I broke mine, they swelled to three times the size and I couldn’t walk.’

‘I can’t either,’ Sophie says, quickly sitting down.

‘All we managed to buy were a couple of baguettes and some doughnuts from the baker’s,’ says Dad, talking over the squabble. ‘We popped in to check out the competition, didn’t we, Georgia?’

‘Their cakes didn’t look as nice as yours, Mum,’ she says.

‘Thank you, Georgia.’ I’m wondering if I should be concerned about the number of outlets there are for cakes in Talyton. I’ve made some plans, projections of how many cakes I need to bake and sell, set against the cost of ingredients, and I reckon I can make enough money to keep us afloat. I’ve been realistic in my calculations and I know it’ll take a while to grow the business, but I’m quietly optimistic. I’m lucky. I haven’t got a mortgage, but I have spent just about every penny I have on buying the house, so I have to make a go of the business.

It isn’t just about earning a living though. It’s about proving something: that I’m not just a divorced mum of three and, at forty, rapidly hurtling into middle age. Okay, I admit that part of me hopes that my future success might sting David into regretting what he did, and I also want my children to be proud of me, but most of all, just for once in my life, I’m doing it for myself.

‘We didn’t see anywhere to buy a pony,’ Georgia goes on. ‘You haven’t forgotten, Mum, have you?’

‘How can I forget when you’re always reminding me?’ I say with a sigh.

‘Well, Mummy, you can’t say I can have one and then change your mind.’ I notice Georgia’s lower lip beginning to tremble.

She’s right. It was a rash promise, made in the heat of the moment, soon after David threw our lives into
upheaval, but now we have the paddock and stables, I have to stick by it.

‘We’ll look for a pony once we’ve settled in. Why don’t you and Sophie make a start on doing whatever you have to do to prepare for it? I’m the first to admit I know nothing about ponies, but I’d guess that you need to check the fences around the paddock and make sure they’re safe.’

‘You said we could have a dog too,’ says Adam.

‘And a cat,’ says Sophie.

‘Now you’re pushing it,’ I say, smiling. I don’t remember mentioning a cat.

‘But that’s not fair! I won’t have a pet of my own.’

‘How do you work that out?’

‘Because I’m having the dog,’ says Adam.

‘And I’m having the pony,’ says Georgia. ‘And it’s perfectly fair, Sophie, because I’m older than you so I must have a pet first.’

‘I thought we’d have a few chickens too,’ I say. ‘You can look after those, Sophie. We’ll have fresh eggs every day.’

She seems satisfied with that.

‘What am I going to do all day, Mum?’ Adam says as the girls disappear off.

‘I don’t know. How about use your initiative?’

‘I could be down at the skate park with Josh …’ Adam says mournfully. ‘I hate this place. It’s so boring.’ Then he brightens. ‘We could go and look for a dog.’

‘I think that can wait for a while,’ Dad says. ‘I think your mum’s got enough to do for now. I’ve found some furniture amongst the junk in the barn which might be useful for the drawing room. I could do with some extra muscle to shift it.’

I notice how Adam looks up from the table and immediately flexes his arms, checking cross-eyed on the size of his biceps which, to be honest, aren’t terribly pronounced yet, although I’ve caught him working on them, using his friend’s weights that he borrowed for a while.

‘You look as if you have plenty of muscle for the job, young man,’ Dad says, and I think, Flattery will get you everywhere, as Adam gets up to go and clean his teeth before going to help.

Mum and I continue cleaning and unpacking, finishing off in the kitchen then making a start on the bathroom. We break for lunch, then carry on for another couple of hours until we can take no more.

‘I don’t know about you, Jennie, but I fancy a lie-down,’ Mum says. ‘I didn’t sleep too well last night.’

‘Have my room,’ I say, feeling guilty that she and Dad slept on an airbed while I had the bed upstairs. ‘I’m going to have five minutes in the garden.’

I take a deckchair and set it up on the back lawn, sitting among the long grasses and wildflowers which seem to have taken over. I can hear Dad and Adam now and then through the open windows of the drawing room, debating over the best position for an old wicker sofa. I can hear the girls too, cantering about and whinnying as they play ponies in the paddock, and the occasional shriek of complaint as they argue over the finer points of equitation. The sun warms my skin and the birds sing high in the sky above the twisted oaks that mark the end of my property at the top of the hill. At the far end of the paddock is an area which the estate agent called the orchard. I count the apple trees that are laden with fruit. I count to eleven then close my eyes, listening to the bees nearby. I can allow
myself to relax at last. This is what I’ve been looking for. It’s perfect until …

‘Mum … Mummee! Look out!’ I jerk awake from my snooze on hearing the girls’ frantic yells. ‘They’re coming to get you.’

‘They? What do you mean, they?’

‘The cows!’

I grab at the struts of my chair, holding on tight, as I examine the situation. I’m surrounded by red roan and white cows that have formed a semi-circle around me, and are inspecting me like a group of curious great-aunts. They stare, eyes dark and soft; their noses dripping with moisture. One belches then starts chewing, its lower jaw moving from side to side. Another stretches down, sticks out a very long tongue, wraps it around a clump of grass, tears it and swallows it straight down.

The only times I’ve been this close to a cow before it’s either been safely on the other side of a fence at a petting farm or else on a plate. They’re much bigger than I remember, quite solid, and they all look the same to me. What’s most unnerving is the way they are shifting slowly towards me as more cows trudge into the garden behind them. I’m not sure whether to stay where I am, to flee or to fight.

‘They are d-d-definitely vegetarian, aren’t they?’ I stammer. I start to get up – very slowly, remembering that we haven’t yet ascertained whether these are cows or bulls.

‘Mum,’ calls Georgia. ‘It’s all right. You’ll be safe now. The man’s coming to get them.’

‘Hey, Mummy, guess what?’ yells Sophie. ‘It’s the country bum-kin.’

‘Sophie!’ I say, but it’s too late. The man – the
tractor driver we met in the lane – cannot fail to have heard her. He strides towards me and the cows. He’s an imposing figure, about six foot tall in his brown work boots, and broad-shouldered, and he’s carrying a big stick. I move around behind the deckchair.

‘Country bumpkin, eh?’ he says, looking towards Sophie who’s standing on the fence with Georgia.

‘That’s what Mummy said,’ Sophie says, unfazed by his approach. ‘Although you seem to have lost your hat and your feather and your piece of straw.’

My face burns as he goes on, ‘I expect they’ll turn up sometime.’ He turns to me. ‘We haven’t been introduced,’ he says, tucking his stick under one arm and retying the sleeves of his bottle-green boiler-suit around his waist.

‘Jennie Copeland.’ I have contemplated reverting to my maiden name but decided against it, fearing it would be too confusing for the children. I feel very much like a maiden at this moment, a modest one, trying to keep her eyes averted from this vision of manhood, his ragged vest clinging to the slabs of his pectorals, the muscles in his arms taut and clearly defined.

‘Guy Barnes,’ he says curtly, staring back at me, taking in, no doubt, my stained top and scruffy jeans. ‘I believe we share a drive.’