David Nobbs - The Second Life of Sally Mottram

Each mouthful was a hurdle, but now she was in the final straight. Chomp chomp. Finished! Good girl! She’s eaten all her dinner! Who’s a clever Sally?

‘Delicious.’

She longed for something sweet. How humiliating to long so much for something so unimportant.

Sam was clearing up, and soon Beth rose to help.

‘I’m afraid we don’t do desserts,’ said Sam.

‘We’ve turned our backs on sugar,’ said Beth.

‘That’s fine,’ lied Sally. ‘I wouldn’t have been able to eat another mouthful anyway.’

They refused to let her into the kitchen to help. It was too small.

‘You go and sit down and relax,’ said Sam.

Relax!

It wasn’t only the kitchen that was too small. So was the lounge/diner, and her bedroom, and the bathroom. She longed to leave, and she was committed to staying for four whole days. She couldn’t leave early. Sam was her son.

She felt at a loss, having no fire to sit by. There were just two armchairs, depressingly dark green and past their best. They were arranged facing the television set, the open fire of modern living. The central heating made the flat warm, almost stuffily so, but it wasn’t the same as a fire. How spoilt she had been with her nice house in the best road in Potherthwaite. How could she not have fully appreciated it until she was on the point of losing it? She hadn’t had a bad life, until Barry’s death of course, but it had been … ordinary.

Rather like Barnet. And Beth. And the lasagne.

When they had washed up, Sam and Beth joined her. Sam plonked himself into the other armchair. Beth pulled a wooden chair over and sat between them. Sally wished she sat more gracefully. She also wished that her son had been more polite.

‘Is there anything you want to watch?’ asked Sam hopefully.

Yes. The movement of the hands of the carriage clock on the mantelpiece as it leads me slowly but reliably towards the moment in four days’ time when I can leave this prison. Sally, that is not worthy of you. Pull yourself together – isn’t that what this trip is all about?

‘Not really, thank you. I’m not a great telly watcher.’

‘I’ll open another bottle of wine,’ said Sam, standing up.

‘I’ll do it,’ said Beth hastily.

Beth didn’t want to be alone with her! Come on, Sally. Be bright and friendly. Let Beth in.

‘Nice of you to bring all that wine, Mum.’

I brought it for myself, in case I needed it, but we don’t need to go into motive, do we?

‘I want us to be cheery, Sam. I want us to start to get over what’s happened together. We need each other.’

Beth brought the wine and they all made an effort and really the conversation wasn’t too bad at all, but all the time Sally was aware of Sam’s anxiety.

Then Beth stood up.

‘I’m a bit tired,’ she said. ‘I’m off to bed.’

She kissed Sam. Sally moved to stand up but Beth said ‘Don’t get up’ and bent down and kissed her. Sally realized that Beth wanted to say something. What could it be? ‘It’s great to have you here’? ‘Sam and I both hope you’ll move down near us’? ‘Let’s have a lovely four days’?

‘I’ve put you two towels and there’s a glass of water by your bed,’ said Beth.

When Beth had gone, Sally asked, ‘Is she being tactful?’

‘What?’

‘Going to bed early. Leaving us alone together.’

‘Ah. Oh, I see. No, no. Beth always goes to bed early.’

‘Right. Well, anyway, Sam … um … we may as well kill this bottle.’

‘Oh. Right. Yes.’

Sam poured and they clinked glasses.

‘Good to have you here, Mum.’

‘Thanks. Good to be here. Sam?’

‘Yes?’ said Sam warily.

‘Um … I hope I’m not going to put my foot in it …’

‘You couldn’t, Mum.’

‘No, but seriously, I must ask you … I know you, you can’t hide things from me. Something’s worrying you, and that worries me. Is there anything … is there something … on your mind?’

‘Well … I mean … Mum, I’m twenty-three, you’ve had a terrible experience, I don’t want to burden you with my worries.’

‘I want you to burden me, Sam. It’s what I’m for.’

‘OK. OK. They say every problem is about sex or money.’

He paused.

‘Go on.’

‘You don’t need to be Einstein to know that my problem’s money. I’m sorry you’ve noticed, I’ve really tried not to show it, but … I’m scared shitless, Mum.’

‘Right, so … why are you … scared shitless?’

‘I’m a fairly junior accountant, Beth’s a dentist’s receptionist and she isn’t the pushy type, so neither of us is very well paid, our degrees haven’t been much of a passport to anything, and at this moment of time we owe between us a small matter of sixty-eight thousand pounds.’

‘Oh my God. That’s awful. You poor boy. Poor Beth.’ She turned angry. ‘It’s a scandal that young people have this enormous pressure. Doesn’t this nation value education?’

‘Not enough, obviously. Beth knows two girls with violent anorexia because of their worries, and a bloke I knew at Keele topped … Oh God, I’m sorry, Mum. Mum, I’m so sorry.’

‘Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten, and I’m sorry too. Poor bloke.’

‘No, but that phrase, it’s …’

‘It’s what people say. Words don’t hurt compared to … what’s happened.’

‘No. Sorry.’

‘What did Beth take her degree in?’

Sam blushed slightly. He looked better when he had a bit of colour.

‘Conservation.’

‘I see.’

‘Mum, this is going to sound awful, but … now that we’ve started … I don’t know how to put it … I’m embarrassed.’

‘Don’t be.’

‘Well … I mean, don’t think Beth and I have ever been wildly extravagant.’

Sally couldn’t avoid taking a little look around the room. The walls were bare except for two posters.

‘I’ve never thought that.’

‘Good. But … I hope in a way this is a compliment, but … we’ve regarded you as a kind of a safety net.’

‘Always be here to help, you mean?’

‘Well, yes. In a way. I mean, you seemed to have plenty of money. Dad a lawyer.’

‘Sadly, not all lawyers are rich.’

‘Not rich, but Dad’s always been scrupulously fair about things, and you’ve always been very generous, you’ve been absolutely marvellous, and …’

‘Could you repeat that?’

‘What?’

‘That I’ve been absolutely marvellous.’

‘Well, of course you have. Didn’t you know that?’

‘Not really, no. So I’d like … it would just be nice to hear it again.’

‘Right. Right. Mum, you’ve always … Sorry. I can’t do it. Not … on request. I mean, of course I mean it, but it just slipped out, I can’t just … sorry.’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

But it did.

‘Beth is scared shitless too.’

‘Well, at least I’ll be able to use the lavatory whenever I want to.’

‘What?’

‘You won’t need it. You’re both scared shitless.’

‘Mum!’

‘Just trying to lighten things, Sam. Just trying to show I’m not a stuffy old has-been, failed utterly but so what? Is there a drop more?’

‘Just a bit. You have it.’

‘No, no.’

‘I insist.’

‘OK.’

Sam drained the bottle into Sally’s glass. There were no dregs. The days of affording wines with dregs were over.

‘You’re trying to find out, very tactfully, how much I’m still going to be good for.’

‘Mum!’

‘No. You are. And I don’t blame you. And nothing about your dad upsets me more than this. He’s left me unable to help you. To any extent. Meaningfully.’

‘I see. Well, I think I sort of knew.’