An Almost Perfect Holiday

by Lucy Diamond

  Even now, for Maggie, the unfolding of a map promised so much interest and discovery. She’d been looking forward to having Amelia to herself this fortnight, the two of them poring over the marks on the paper together and plotting their days out, as a return to old times, a nod back to all the other maps they’d enjoyed studying in summers gone by. But that could wait, she supposed. They could check out the area later on, make some plans then. And anyway, look on the bright side, Maggie, she ordered herself. This was a good thing, really – Amelia being positive about the holiday and heading out for a swim of her own volition. When Maggie had rather pessimistically been expecting her to plug straight into the Wi-Fi, then go up to her bedroom and catch up on all her social media in sulking solitude until it was time to eat. She’d been steeling herself for battles about going out anywhere interesting, now that Amelia was claiming to find everything boring and lame. And yet here was her daughter, choosing exercise and fresh air for herself after all and, in so doing, completely defying her mother’s low expectations. How could she possibly complain about that?

  Swimming was a great idea. They’d had a long and rather fractious journey, the roads clogged with traffic and the air-con in the car seemingly suffering an existential crisis. The prospect of sliding underwater into cool, tranquil blue was immensely appealing.

  Hurrying up the narrow staircase to her bedroom with its pleasing, pared-down simplicity – every time Maggie went on holiday, she found herself vowing to live with fewer possessions, to adopt a more spartan lifestyle, although it never lasted – she began unpacking her clothes. Jumpers, hoodies, T-shirts, hiking leggings . . . ah, her swimming costume, there it was. She shut the curtains and stripped off, briefly noticing that her legs could do with a shave, before squeezing herself into the black one-piece.

  There were two towels folded in a neat pile on the end of the bed and she picked them both up, in case Amelia hadn’t remembered one, in her haste – and hoped with a small shiver of trepidation that the water wouldn’t be too cold. The pool was heated, apparently, but this was England, after all, and although it had been a warm sunny day, it was now almost six o’clock and the air temperature was starting to fall. A quick dip before dinner would be lovely, though, she reminded herself bracingly, imagining the two of them laughing together as they attempted wonky underwater handstands and tried to remember how to do tumble-turns. It would be a really holidayish thing to do. Perhaps even start the mother–daughter bonding!

  Voices floated up to her from outside, interrupting her daydream, and she opened the curtains again and peered out, just in time to see a boy leaping into the water beside Amelia with a massive splash. Amelia shrieked and Maggie gasped in alarm, her hand fumbling immediately with the window catch, meaning to tell the idiot off in no uncertain terms. How dare he? What a foolhardy thing to do! Was Amelia all right?

  In the next second, though, she realized her daughter’s shriek was one of laughter, not distress. In fact the two of them, Amelia and the boy, were now splashing each other deliberately, with great armfuls of water fountaining up between them, and the air vibrated with their loud squeals of merriment.

  Maggie took a step back from the window and caught sight of her reflection in the long pine-framed mirror that hung nearby. She saw a tall, spindly woman staring back at her, with broken veins and cellulite marbling her pale stubbled legs. An unflattering swimming costume. Bushy armpits and bingo wings, her unkempt mud-brown hair in sore need of a trim, or even a style. Maggie might be at odds with her daughter these days, but she still had just about enough self-awareness to realize that Amelia would not thank her for joining her in the pool right now. In fact, if she went out there like this, Amelia would be shrieking for all the wrong reasons.

  Maggie put the towels down again, then sat heavily on the bed beside them. After a moment, she unpeeled her shoulder straps and put her bra back on, then dressed once more and tucked the swimming costume in a drawer. Okay, she said to herself. Change of plan. This was fine, though. This was good! Amelia had made a friend. Amelia would think twice about the holiday being boring. Meanwhile, Maggie would make dinner and listen to Radio 4, and then they would have a lovely evening together.

  Forty-five minutes passed. It was now seven o’clock, and Maggie’s risotto had reached the point where it needed to be eaten, or risked cooling to an unpalatable stodge. Amelia, meanwhile, had still not returned.

  Maggie had resisted going outside to the pool for this long, knowing that her appearance there could well result in a frosty look from her daughter or, worse, accusations of spying or interfering. Ever since Amelia had become best friends with the awful Tara, she had recast her mother as Embarrassment Number One, to be avoided at all costs. But it was perfectly reasonable to go out and announce that dinner was ready, surely?

  She began to open the front door then found herself hesitating there on the mat as their voices drifted over to her. ‘You should come with us, it’s only a couple of miles away, I think,’ the boy was saying, and Maggie stiffened as she tried and failed to make out Amelia’s indistinct reply. Come with him? Miles away? What, now, when she had dinner ready to serve?

  Through the gap in the door, she could make out their two heads at one edge of the pool, sleek as seals, companionably close. Their wet folded arms propped on the side reminded Maggie of angular mathematical brackets, the late sun splashing gold across their damp skin.

  She hadn’t caught Amelia’s reply, but the boy was now speaking again. ‘That’s all right, you can borrow my mum’s,’ she heard him say. ‘She’ll be cool about it.’

  Then came one of Amelia’s sarcastic snorts, a muttered reply at which the boy laughed. Maggie felt herself flush hot all over, wondering if that had been a rude comment about her not being cool about anything much. She had only herself to blame for eavesdropping, a voice reproached in her head, but all the same: suspecting your child was betraying you to a complete stranger was hurtful, whatever the circumstances.

  The boy briefly turned his head towards the biggest cottage, presumably where he was staying, as if checking nobody was listening, then said, ‘Mine’s madly in love and very negligent right now. Plus she’s brought tons of booze. I’ll easily be able to sneak some out, so if—’

  Maggie prickled all over. No, thank you very much, she thought, as a protective maternal instinct – her inner lioness! – propelled her from the house immediately. She strode out with such vigour, in fact, that the door flew right open and banged against the stone wall behind her. ‘Dinner’s ready,’ she said, her voice clipped and hard-sounding. She had changed her mind completely about any kind of friendship between Amelia and this boy; she would not be encouraging it in the slightest. Quite the opposite.

  The boy regarded her with interest, then gave her a dazzling smile. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I’m Jack. We’re staying in—’

  ‘Yes,’ Maggie interrupted, paying him no attention. She knew boys like him from her years of teaching: the confident, cocky ones, all good looks and charm. They turned into the worst kind of men. ‘Dinner, Amelia,’ she said.

  Amelia had turned red, no doubt from Maggie’s brusque dismissal of her new friend. Well, so be it. ‘I’m not hungry,’ she said, before turning back to Jack. ‘Want to do a few more lengths?’

  ‘Er . . .’ His gaze tick-tocked between them. He was polite, Maggie gave him that, because he clearly felt uncomfortable about siding with Amelia against her mother. ‘I should probably go in for dinner soon myself,’ he said after a moment. ‘Let me know about tomorrow, yeah?’

  Amelia smiled at him and Maggie’s heart twisted a little because she looked so beautiful when she smiled like that, with her whole face relaxed and her eyes sparkly. ‘Yeah, nice one,’ she said. Her expression froze over as she turned back to Maggie, though. ‘You don’t have to loom over me like that,’ she hissed. ‘I am coming.’

  Jack eased himself out of the pool and slouched off to where he’d left a towel on a lounger, water dripping from his limb
s. He had golden hair, sort of lion-coloured, and was athletic in build. Probably captain of the school football team, Maggie guessed darkly. Breaking a different heart with every new term. Well, not today, sunshine.

  ‘Bye, Amelia,’ he called as he loped away.

  As soon as he’d gone, Amelia’s anger flared. ‘God, Mum! You don’t need to embarrass me,’ she snarled. ‘For Christ’s sake! Why do you always have to do that?’

  ‘Do what? Make dinner for you and tell you it’s ready?’ Maggie replied caustically. You couldn’t win with teenagers, once they’d convinced themselves that you were the enemy. You simply couldn’t win. ‘Should I communicate by flags and semaphore next time? Sign language through the window?’

  Amelia rolled her eyes, as if even speaking to her mother had become an ordeal. ‘Please don’t,’ she huffed, hauling herself out of the water and stalking over to the lawn to retrieve her towel.

  Maggie bit her lip, feeling as if she’d made a hash of everything, but unsure how she could have handled the situation any differently. Why didn’t human beings come with a manual, a clear set of instructions that one could follow? ‘I’ll go and dish up,’ she said, walking back towards the front door.

  Dinner was something of a damp squib, not least because of the unappetizingly clumpy risotto that refused to redeem itself, even with the additions of roasted butternut squash and cubes of feta, but also because Amelia was in a towering mood with Maggie, barely saying a civil word. After ten minutes or so of strained silence, she pushed her plate away. ‘I’m not really hungry,’ she muttered. ‘Think I’ll head off to the games room for a bit.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Maggie, brightening. It might be fun to have a few rounds of table tennis, she supposed. Laugh over a game of table football or whatever was there. ‘Okay. I’ll come and join you, when I’ve washed up, shall I?’

  ‘Er . . .’ Amelia’s face went red. ‘Well, the others might be there, that’s all, so I thought I’d hang out with them.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Maggie again, disappointment sinking through her like coloured dye in water. Was this how it was going to be for the entire fortnight – this fruitless pursuit? ‘It’s the first night of our holiday, though, I thought we could play cards or . . . ?’

  Amelia sighed. You would think she’d just been asked if she wanted her fingernails ripped out one by one. ‘Do I have to?’

  ‘Or I’ve brought Yahtzee?’ Maggie persisted, trying not to hear how pleading her own voice sounded. ‘If you fancy it?’

  Amelia shook her head. ‘Not really,’ she said. ‘Look, I kind of already said I’d meet them, so . . .’

  So that was that. ‘Okay,’ Maggie said, defeated. ‘But don’t—’

  The front door shut before she could finish her sentence. She wasn’t even sure what she’d been about to say. Don’t do anything silly. Don’t get into trouble. Don’t . . . forget about me.

  Too late, anyway. Maggie was left with all the washing up and then an evening in morose solitude. Not exactly the holiday unity and camaraderie she’d hoped for.

  The following day was a new start, though, and Maggie was determined to put her disappointment from the previous evening behind her. Amelia had come in at ten the night before, and seemed more cheerful at least, although she hadn’t been remotely forthcoming on what she, Jack and his sister had been doing the whole time. ‘Stuff,’ she’d said airily with a shrug. ‘Just hanging out, you know.’

  No, Maggie didn’t know. That was the problem. But Amelia hadn’t smelled of either cigarettes or alcohol, at least, so perhaps the others were innocent and well behaved, like Amelia. Small mercies.

  ‘Morning!’ she said, as Amelia came down for breakfast now, trying not to appear too startled by the fact that her daughter was wearing a full face of make-up, a clingy white vest top and a tiny black denim skirt. Maggie poured her a cup of tea and slotted two pieces of bread into the toaster, Amelia being very much a creature of habit when it came to the first meal of the day. ‘So today I thought we could pack up some lunch things and head over to Cligga Head,’ she began brightly, wishing Amelia would sit down at the small round table with her, rather than leaning slouchily against the door-jamb like that. ‘Remember, we researched it a few months ago and it’s got that granite exposure, which looked really interesting and—’

  But Amelia was already shaking her head. ‘I’m going out with Jack. We’ve arranged to cycle into Falmouth. I’m borrowing a bike from them.’

  Maggie felt her heart sink. ‘Oh, but . . .’ she bleated in disappointment. ‘No,’ she heard herself saying in the next moment. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  Amelia folded her arms across her chest. ‘Yeah. I am,’ she said. ‘Look, it’s my holiday too, Mum. And I don’t want to go and look at boring old granite, or whatever it is, this time. I’m not into that, okay? Anyway, I already said I’d go, so—’

  ‘Well, I’m saying no,’ Maggie said again, hardening; she’d be every bit as tough as granite herself in a minute. ‘You don’t know anything about this boy, or his family. Plus you haven’t been on a bike for ages, let alone going off cycling along major roads. Especially in that skirt! You don’t even have your helmet.’

  ‘I can borrow one. And they’ll hardly be major roads, out here in the sticks,’ Amelia said scathingly. She glanced down at her outfit and shrugged. ‘And I can put on some shorts – big deal.’

  There was a pain in Maggie’s chest as if she’d swallowed something too hot. This was not Amelia speaking to her, she reminded herself, this was Tara Webster’s voice. Cool, streetwise Tara of the thick mascara and side-eye glances. The girl who thought nothing of bringing cherry brandy to Amelia’s birthday sleepover, and whose sole hobby appeared to be pouting suggestively into a camera. ‘But we’ve already got plans,’ she said, trying to claw back some control. ‘Come on, Amelia. The holidays are about us, me and you, spending a bit of time together.’

  As soon as the words were out, she knew they were a mistake. ‘What if I don’t want to spend time with you?’ Amelia retaliated. ‘What if I don’t want to look at a load of old rocks? I mean, who does?’

  It was like being under attack: every exchange a new blow, a new wound. Who does? Well, Maggie did for one, as they both knew. And Amelia too had loved investigating geological sites not so long ago, before she had decided they were too uncool for the likes of her and Tara. ‘But—’

  ‘Mum, you don’t get it. I’m telling, not asking. I’m going out with Jack, so—’

  She was already making her way towards the door and Maggie leapt up and followed her into the small hallway. ‘No, you are not, young lady,’ she said, grabbing Amelia by the wrist. There came a time when you had to put your foot down as a parent, and this was it. High noon. ‘You haven’t even had any breakfast.’

  ‘Get off me,’ shrieked Amelia, pushing her off. ‘God, Mum! If I’ve got bruises because of you, I’m going to . . .’

  They were interrupted by a knock at the door, mere inches away, and they both froze on the spot in a tableau of horrified surprise. For a hysterical moment, Maggie thought it might be the landlady of the cottage, Lorna, coming to have a stern word with them about making so much noise, but then Amelia, who was nearest, dodged away and yanked the door open to reveal someone else altogether. There on the doorstep was a forty-something woman with strawberry-blonde hair in a wavy shoulder-length bob and a smiling face that was covered with freckles. Maggie felt extremely hot and embarrassed that this woman had presumably just heard her and Amelia screaming at each other.

  ‘Hi, I’m Em,’ said the woman. ‘Emma Hughes, your neighbour. From Briar Cottage, or whatever it’s called over there.’

  Maggie blinked, trying to assimilate all of this information as the woman pointed behind her. Emma Hughes had a cheery sort of confidence, standing there in a pink-and-white striped T-shirt and pale-blue cropped trousers, and Maggie guessed that this must be Jack’s mum. Great, she thought, trying not to let her dismay show. ‘Hi,’ she managed t
o croak in reply, mortified to still be in her cotton shortie pyjamas in front of a stranger.

  ‘Just thought I should pop round and introduce myself, as I gather our offspring have cooked up a plan between them,’ the woman – Emma – went on to Maggie. She was wearing make-up, and had sparkly blue stud earrings and clinking rose-gold bangles on her wrist. What kind of person went to so much effort at nine o’clock in the morning? On holiday?

  Emma twinkled her eyes at Amelia in a knowing sort of way. ‘You’re Amelia, I take it. My son is very keen to go off on a jaunt with you.’

  Amelia blushed, but Maggie noticed a small, pleased smile play around on her lips as well. Even though if Maggie had been the one to use a word like ‘jaunt’ in front of someone else’s adolescent, Amelia would be pulling sick faces and hissing at her to stop being weird, rather than smiling in quite such a winning way.

  ‘Yes,’ said Maggie, seeing as her daughter had been struck uncharacteristically dumb. ‘We were just having a discussion about that.’ You probably heard us screeching like banshees from the other side of the door, in fact.

  ‘Well, I thought I’d swing by to say hello and that it’s fine by me, as long as you’re in agreement,’ Emma said, turning to Maggie. ‘Izzie, my eldest, is sixteen and she’s going with them too – she’s very sensible,’ she assured her. ‘And, Amelia, you’re welcome to borrow my bike, if you don’t have one of your own here; it’s not too old-ladyish, I promise you. Jack was thinking ten o’clock or so? Give you a bit of time to have breakfast and whatever. He’s not actually showered yet, the stinking pig, but don’t worry, I’ll make sure he’s decent before I release him from the house.’

  ‘Cool,’ Amelia said, risking a bold side-eye at Maggie, who felt completely backed into a corner by now. ‘I’ll be over at ten.’

  ‘Wait,’ said Maggie, feeling as if this was all happening too fast. ‘You don’t have a bike helmet, Amelia, so—’