Fanny Blake - What Women Want

‘Mum! Where are you?’ she yelled, as she let herself into the dim panelled hallway. Bending to pick up a few scattered letters, mostly bills and mail-order catalogues from the floor, she balanced them in the minimal space available on the small gate-legged table that held the phone.

She called again, putting her head round the door into the sitting room. The knitting left mid-row on the comfy plum-coloured sofa and the voices from Any Questions? on the radio signalled that Adele couldn’t be far away. The gilt mirror over the mantelpiece could have done with a good dusting and the hearth might have benefited from being cleaned out. The books were crammed higgledy-piggledy onto the shelves at either side of the chimney breast. Not for the first time, Bea thought her mother might benefit from moving to somewhere smaller. They had talked about the huge task it would involve, but Adele was waiting until the time was right. Whatever that meant.

‘Mum!’ She heard the familiar edge of impatience creep into her voice. Making a mental note to control it, she tried once more. ‘Mum.’ Better.

‘Here, dear. I’m in the kitchen . . .’ The crash that followed made Bea run down the flagged corridor past the stairs and through the door at the end of the passage. Her mother was on the floor, rubbing her leg, surrounded by saucepans and the rail that was supposed to suspend them within easy reach above the ancient Aga.

‘What on earth are you doing? Are you all right?’ Bea’s relief at seeing her in one piece swiftly turned to exasperation. She righted a fallen chair to where it belonged under the table, trying not to let her irritation show.

‘I’m absolutely fine. I was just trying to straighten the rail. I suppose I should have taken the pans off first. I just pulled a bit too hard and the whole thing collapsed.’ Adele rubbed her elbow where she’d caught it on the Aga.

‘But why didn’t you wait for me to do it for you? We’ve talked about this thousands of times. You could have been hurt.’ Bea couldn’t stop the edge creeping back into her voice.

‘Oh, rubbish, darling. I didn’t want to bother you. Anyway, I wasn’t expecting you,’ she announced breezily.

As Adele got to her feet, brushing plaster dust off her cardigan, Bea registered that she was still wearing her pyjama bottoms and slippers. ‘But, Mum, I’ve come to take you out to lunch. Don’t you remember? We arranged it on Wednesday.’

Adele rolled her eyes to the Kitchen Maid adorned with damp tea towels and her underwear. ‘Of course. How stupid of me. I’ll just be a minute.’

‘But you’re not even dressed yet.’

‘Nor I am.’ Her mother dived into the laundry basket for some tights. ‘It won’t take me long, darling.’ She disappeared along the corridor and up the stairs.

Bea stayed where she was, bending to pick up the pans. Should she be more concerned about Adele? Her feelings of responsibility for her mother weighed heavy even though she knew they weren’t wanted. If something happened to Adele, it would be her fault. After all, of the three children, she was the one who lived closest. Will had married his Australian girlfriend and won the bonus prize of a new life in Sydney while Jess was wrapped up in her perfect family of one long-suffering husband and two children (she’d have had the point-four if she could have arranged it) in spick-and-span heaven outside Edinburgh. Bea resolved to bring up the subject of moving house again, but not right now. She didn’t want to spoil the afternoon ahead.

Tempted though she was to do the bit of washing-up piled by the sink, she ignored it, knowing that her mother would only take her help as a form of criticism. Instead she returned to the sitting room to put the fireguard in place before standing and staring out of the window at the long garden stretching towards the copse beyond. Just the sight of it brought back all those years of hide-and-seek, bonfires, camping. If only Ben could have enjoyed the place in the same way, but childhood was different these days. Nobody was thrown outside after lunch and told to ‘go and play’ for a couple of hours any more. She could imagine Ben’s reaction if she’d ever dared to try.

‘I’m ready.’ Adele came into the room, having put on a taupe cotton skirt with a neat white blouse, car keys in hand.

‘I’ll drive, Ma.’ Although Adele’s doctor seemed to think she was still capable, the idea of her mother driving scared the hell out of Bea. She wasn’t frightened for Adele but for everybody else on the road. ‘You can navigate.’

‘Where are we going again?’

‘The Hare and Hounds in Ludborough. If we get there early enough we’ll be able to sit outside.’

The lanes were almost empty as Bea drove, ignoring Adele’s uncertain directions and relying on the satnav. They arrived without mishap and pulled into the already busy car park alongside the pub. Above the porch, darkened windows winked out from behind the profusion of vivid pink and red petunias, yellow golden eye and trailing blue lobelia crammed into the window boxes. Mother and daughter picked their way through the dim lounge bar, ordering their drinks en route, and out into the back garden, blinking at the sudden light.

It was the best kind of English summer’s day – blue sky with puffs of cloud chased across it by a light wind. Sitting in the pub garden at a table in the shade of a whispering beech tree with a bowl of soup, a chunk of crusty bread and a glass of lager, the world seemed a better place. Inevitably, the conversation moved immediately to Bea’s own life. As usual, her mother could be relied upon to put her mind to good use when listening to Bea, helping her to get matters into some sort of perspective.

Although she was of the generation of middle-class wives whose pregnancy had put an end to their ambition and who had stayed at home to bring up their children, Adele was an intelligent woman, whose husband had trusted her good sense when he had had to make his own business decisions. She had known exactly how his bank functioned, who worked there and what they did or didn’t contribute and how he was able to manipulate them to his success. As a result, she had developed a pragmatic stance from which to view life. So, as far as she could see, whatever happened at Coldharbour, there was nothing Bea could do to influence events. If she wanted to keep her job, or until she had decided whether or not she did, she should put her head down and work hard, adopting the stance that Adam Palmer expected: tough, go-getting. When she’d won his confidence, she’d be in a position to make a choice. As for Ben, had Bea ever seen a monosyllabic twenty-two-year-old who spent all day in front of the TV? Of course not. The boy would grow out of it, just like all the others. Bea had a nasty feeling that there were plenty of twenty-two-year-olds who never had.

Later, as Adele was laughing at the story of her daughter’s latest dating fiasco, Bea’s phone rang.

‘Bea, it’s Kate. You’ll never guess.’

‘Well, for God’s sake tell me, then.’

‘It’s Ellen. She’s got herself a man!’

For a moment Bea was thrown. ‘Ellen? Hang on a minute.’ She held up one finger and gestured to her mother that she wouldn’t be long.

Adele nodded, quite content to watch what was going on at the tables around her while she waited for Bea to finish.

‘Yes, Ellen. Your old university friend who’s been single since her husband died. That Ellen.’ Bea could hear Kate’s excitement. ‘I went to the gallery this morning and she told me. He’s one of her customers!’

‘You have got to be joking. After all this time? Who is he? When did she meet him?’ Bea was ashamed to admit to herself that, instead of sharing Kate’s evident pleasure, she was piqued by the idea that, after years of apparent indifference to the opposite sex, Ellen had beaten her to it. Somehow the natural order of things seemed to have been skewed.