by Beth O'Leary
“I think it’s very wise of you to call it a day on the driving, Eileen,” Betsy says.
“I’m still driving,” I say, sitting up straighter. “I’m just sharing Marian’s car.”
“Oh, you are still driving?” Betsy says. “Gosh. Aren’t you brave, after that mishap on Sniddle Road!”
Betsy is a kind soul, and a very dear friend, but she is also excellent at saying rude things in a tone of voice that means you can’t object to them. As for my “mishap” on Sniddle Road, it’s hardly worth mentioning. I’ll admit it wasn’t my best attempt at parking, but who would’ve thought that man’s four-by-four would dent so easily? The thing looked like a ruddy tank.
“Given up on your latest project, then, have you?” Basil asks, rubbing biscuit crumbs out of his mustache. “Weren’t you ferrying lost dogs around in that car?”
“I was helping the kind folks at the Daredale dog rescue center,” I say with dignity. “But they have their own transportation now.”
“I’m sure you’ll be on to something else soon enough!” Basil says with a chuckle.
I narrow my eyes.
“Have you given up on getting us a sponsor for May Day yet?” he goes on. “No big businesses willing to lend their name to a little village fete?”
I grit my teeth. As it happens, I have struggled to find a sponsor for the May Day festival. I’d hoped we could use any funds raised for the cancer charity that did so much for Carla, rather than for covering the costs, as we usually do. But these days it’s hard to even get somebody to speak to you at the big companies in Leeds, and the local businesses I tried are all tightening their belts and don’t have any money to spare.
“Funny that!” Basil chortles.
“I shan’t apologize for wanting to make a difference in this world, Basil,” I say icily.
“Quite right, quite right,” Basil says. “And it’s very brave of you to keep at it against the odds, I say.”
Conversation shifts, mercifully; Penelope turns to Piotr, discussing Roland’s latest ailment, and I take the opportunity to snatch a word with Betsy.
“Have you spoken to your daughter again, love?” I ask her in a low voice. “About visiting?”
Betsy purses her lips. “I tried,” she says. “No luck.”
It’s Betsy’s husband who’s the issue. Her daughter won’t be in a room with him any more. I understand—Cliff’s a nasty piece of work, and I don’t know how Betsy’s borne it over all these years. Even Wade couldn’t stand the man. But cutting Betsy off from her family is surely only going to make everything worse. Still, it’s not my place to interfere; I give her hand a squeeze.
“She’ll come when she’s ready,” I say.
“Well, she better not leave it too long,” Betsy says. “I am eighty!”
I smile at that. Betsy’s eighty-five. Even when she’s trying to make the point that she is old, she can’t help lying about her age.
“… Knargill buses are down to one a day,” Basil’s saying to Roland on the other side of me. “Can’t help thinking that’s part of the problem.”
Basil’s favorite things to complain about are, in this order: squirrels, transport links, weather conditions, and the state of the nation. You shouldn’t get him started on any of these topics, but it is particularly worth avoiding the last one, as it becomes very hard to like Basil once he starts talking about immigration.
“And there she was,” Basil’s saying, “drowned in her leek and potato soup! Ghoulish sight, I expect. Poor young lady who found her had just come round to see if she wanted new double glazing, found the door unlocked, and there she was—dead a week and nobody knew it!”
“What’s this, Basil?” I ask. “Are you telling horror stories again?”
“Lady over in Knargill,” Basil says, sipping his tea complacently. “Drowned in her bowl of soup.”
“That’s awful!” says Betsy.
“Were there flies and maggots by the time they found her?” asks Penelope, with interest.
“Penelope!” everybody choruses, then we all immediately turn to Basil for the answer.
“Likely,” he says, nodding sagely. “Very likely. Poor lady was only seventy-nine. Husband died the year before. Didn’t have a soul in the world to care for her. The neighbors said she’d go months without speaking to anyone but the birds.”
I suddenly feel peculiar, a little light-headed, maybe, and as I reach for another ginger snap I notice my hand is trembling more than usual.
I suppose I’m thinking this poor lady was the same age as me. But that’s where the similarity ends, I tell myself firmly. I’d never choose leek and potato soup, for starters—so bland.
I swallow. Yesterday’s incident with the jar was an unpleasant reminder of exactly how easy it can be to stop coping. And not coping can turn drastic quickly when you’re on your own.
“We should do more for people like that,” I say suddenly. “With all the bus timetables getting cut down and the Dales Senior Transport lot having funding trouble, it’s hard for them to get anywhere even if they want to.”
Everyone looks rather surprised. Usually if the inhabitants of Knargill are mentioned in a Neighborhood Watch meeting, it’s followed by some mischievous cackling from Betsy, who will then declare “it serves them right for living in Knargill.”
“Well, yes, I suppose,” Penelope says querulously into the silence.
“Let’s put it on the next agenda,” I say. I make a note on my printout.
There’s a slightly awkward pause.
“You know, over in Firs Blandon they’re talking about setting up a rival May Day celebration,” Basil says, looking at me shrewdly, as if he’s testing my loyalties.
“They’re not!” I say, tsking. Basil ought to know I’d never side with Firs Blandon. A decade or two ago, when Hamleigh lost power for three days after a big storm, all the other villages offered funds and spare rooms to help those who couldn’t manage without their heaters. Not a soul in Firs Blandon lifted a finger. “Well,” I say staunchly, “a Firs Blandon May Day will never be as good as ours.”
“Of course it won’t!” Betsy declares, and everybody relaxes now we’re back on safe ground. “More biscuits, anybody?”
The rest of the meeting passes as normal, but my nasty peculiar feeling nags me all day. I’m glad Leena’s coming tomorrow. I’m rather worn out, and it’s an awful lot easier to be independent when there’s somebody else there with you.
5
Leena
Hamleigh-in-Harksdale is as cute as it sounds. The village is cozied between two hills in the south of the Yorkshire Dales; I can just see its rooftops and wonky chimneys between tawny crags as the bus rattles along the valley road.
I didn’t grow up in Hamleigh—Mum only moved there when Carla got sick. There are two versions of the village in my mind: half my memories have a sweet, sepia-toned childhood nostalgia to them, and the other half are darkly painful, raw with loss. My stomach clenches. I try to remember how I felt here as a child, the joy of coming around this bend in the road to see Hamleigh’s roofs ahead of us.
Even when we were teenagers, always at each other’s throats, Carla and I would make peace for the duration of a visit to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. We’d grouch about the parties we’d be missing as Mum drove us up from Leeds, but as soon as we got to Hamleigh we remembered who we were here. Illicit cider and kissing with sixth-form boys would seem slightly absurd, like something from someone else’s life. We’d be outside all day, collecting blackberries together in old Tupperwares with cracks in their lids, not caring about the scratches on our newly shaven legs until we were back home and had them on show under school skirts rolled up at the waist.
I watch the colors of the Dales streak by through the grubby bus window: russets, greens, the sandy gray of drystone walls. Sheep lift dozy eyes our way as we pass. It’s drizzling lightly; I can almost smell it already, the way the rain makes the earth smell bright, as if it’s just woken up. The ai
r is fresher here.
Not here on the bus, of course. The air on the bus smells of stale sleep and somebody’s chicken tikka sandwich. But as soon as I step out, I know that first breath in will be beautiful.
Hamleigh itself is made up of just three streets: Lower Lane, Middling Lane, and Peewit Street, which really ought to have been called Upper Lane, but there we are, that’s quirky village life for you. The houses are mostly squat limestone cottages with higgledy slate roofs, but to the farthest edge of Middling Lane there’s a new development—it stands out like a cold sore on the corner of the village, all brash orange brick and black-edged windows. Grandma despises it. Whenever I point out to her that Britain is in desperate need of new affordable housing, she says, “only because buggers like you keep spending so much on shoebox flats in London,” which I have to concede is a pretty sound point, economically speaking. I only wish I was one of the buggers who’d actually got around to doing that instead of choosing to spend tens of thousands on renting the artisan warehouse lifestyle.
I head straight from the bus stop to Grandma’s house. I find myself averting my eyes as I walk past the turning on to Mum’s street, like when you pass a traffic accident on the motorway, horribly aware of it pulling at the corner of your vision.
My grandmother’s house is the most beautiful one in the village: Clearwater Cottage, No 5 Middling Lane. A wibbly old slate roof, wisteria climbing up the front wall, a ruby red door … It’s a fairy-tale home. That knot of anxiety lodged between my ribs loosens as I walk up the garden path.
I lift the knocker.
“Leena?” comes Grandma’s voice.
I frown. I look right, then left, then up.
“Grandma!” I shriek.
My grandmother is halfway up the apple tree to the left-hand side of the front door. She’s almost as high as the upstairs windows, each foot wedged against a branch, dressed in khaki trousers and a brown top, both of which merge very effectively with the greenery. If it weren’t for the shock of white hair, I might not have spotted her.
“What the hell are you doing up that tree?”
“Pruning!” Grandma calls. She waves a large, sharp implement at me. I wince. I am not reassured by this.
“You’re very … high up!” I say, trying to be tactful. I don’t want to say she’s too old for this, but all I can think about is that episode of 24 Hours in A&E where an elderly lady fell off a chair and broke six bones. This tree is considerably higher than a chair.
Grandma begins to shimmy down. Really. Shimmy.
“Take it slow! Don’t rush on my account!” I call, nails biting into my palms.
“There!” Grandma even hops the last bit of the drop, brushing her hands on her thighs. “If you want something done well, do it yourself,” she tells me. “I’ve been waiting for the tree man to come for months.”
I look her over. She seems unscathed. Actually she looks well, if a little tired—there’s some color in her cheeks, and her brown eyes are bright behind her green-rimmed glasses. I reach forward to pull a leaf out of her hair, and smooth it back into its usual loose, wavy bob. She takes my hand and squeezes it.
“Hello, love,” she says, face melting into a smile. “Hot chocolate?”
* * *
Grandma makes hot chocolate the proper way: on the stove, with cream and real chocolate. It’s pure decadence in a mug. Carla used to say that if you have more than one you won’t have room for meals for the rest of the day, and it is my absolute favorite thing.
I make myself useful, putting away the dishes from the drainer by the sink as Grandma stirs the chocolate. It’s been months since I’ve been here—I came up last when Grandpa Wade left, at the end of last year—but everything still looks exactly the same. That orange wood of the skirting boards and kitchen units, the faded, patterned rugs, the wonky family photos in frames on the walls.
You can’t even tell that Grandpa Wade has gone—or, rather, that he was ever here. I don’t think he took anything with him except clothes. Clearwater Cottage has always felt like Grandma’s house, not his. Grandpa just used to occupy an armchair in the corner of the living room, listening to talk radio and ignoring everyone. It was such a shock when he left with that ballroom dance teacher—not because I’d thought he loved Grandma, just because I’d never imagined he had it in him to run off with anybody. He’s the sort of person who likes to have something to complain about, but never actually does anything. I could only conclude that the dance instructor did most of the legwork on the seduction front.
“I’m so glad you’re here, love,” Grandma says, looking over her shoulder at me as she stirs the hot chocolate in its special pan.
“I’m sorry. I should have been back sooner.” I fiddle with the magnets on the fridge.
“I don’t blame you for staying in London,” Grandma says. “I’d have done the same at your age, if I could have.”
I glance up at her. Grandma doesn’t often talk about the past—she always says she prefers to look forward than backward. I do know she’d had a job lined up in London before she met Grandpa, when she was in her twenties. Then they got married, and they settled here, and that was that. That’s how she’s always put it: that was that.
Though it occurs to me now that didn’t have to be that.
“You could still go to London,” I tell her. “You could even move there, if you wanted to, now Grandpa’s not here to hold you back.”
Grandma pours the hot chocolate into mugs. “Oh, don’t be daft,” she says. “I can’t be jetting off to London, not when your mother needs me.”
I wince. “She’d cope, Grandma. She’s not as fragile as you think she is.”
Grandma gives me a look at that, as if to say, And you’d know, would you?
I turn away and spot Grandma’s project diary open on the table. This project diary goes everywhere with her—she treats it the way I treat my phone, always horrified if she discovers it’s not in her handbag, even if she’s just nipping out for some milk from the shop.
“What’s on today’s to-do list, then?” I ask, then frown. “Own teeth?” I gasp. “Likely to be dull in bed? What is this?”
Grandma snatches up the diary. “Nothing!”
“Are you blushing?” I don’t think I’ve ever seen my grandmother blush before.
Her hand flies to her cheek. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she says. “We did away with blushing in the 1960s.”
I laugh and reach to take her hand from her cheek. “Nope, definite rosy hue,” I inform her. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on? Is this some new project? They’re not usually this weird.”
She presses her lips together, her peachy lipstick gathering in the folds.
“Oh, God, sorry, Grandma.” I lead her over to sit down at the table. “Is this something important, and I’m being an idiot?”
“No, no,” Grandma says, very unconvincingly.
I attempt to prise the diary from her hand; after a moment, reluctantly, she lets go.
I skim over the list she’s made. It’s pretty obvious what it is, now. My heart goes a gooey, bittersweet sort of warm just reading it, because as well as being lovely, as well as being so very Grandma, this list is also kind of sad.
Grandma’s shoulders are tensed; she’s watching me warily, and I kick myself for being so insensitive.
“Well,” I say, “this won’t do at all.” I look back down at the list. “Basil’s the one with the mustache and the Britain First sticker on his bumper, isn’t he?”
“Yes,” Grandma says, still looking wary.
“Do you like him?”
“Well, I…” Grandma trails off. “Not really,” she confesses. “He’s a bit of a bigot.”
I reach for a pen and cross Basil off the list.
“Wait!” Grandma says. “Maybe I could … grow to like him…”
Her tone makes me wince. She sounds so weary. As if Basil is the best she can hope for. She’s not being herself—Eileen Cotton would never settl
e for a man like Basil. Well, she settled for Grandpa Wade, I suppose, but I always got the impression she’d known that was a mistake and just stuck with him out of a stubborn sort of loyalty—their relationship was more a partnership they’d reconciled themselves to than a marriage. When he left her she seemed to see it not as a betrayal so much as an act of extreme rudeness.
“Rule number one of dating,” I tell Grandma, in the tone of voice I use when Bee is flagging and considering going back to one of the crappy dates she had the week before. “You cannot change a man. Even if he does have his own teeth. Next: Mr. Rogers. Isn’t that the vicar’s dad?”
“He’s a lovely man,” Grandma says rather hopefully. I’m pleased to see her shoulders have loosened up a bit.
I scan her pros and cons. I can’t help but let out another little half-laugh, half-gasp when I read her comments on Mr. Rogers—then I catch her expression and shake myself. “Right. Clearly you’re looking for something more … physical than Mr. Rogers is willing to offer.”
“Oh, lord, this is a peculiar conversation to have with your granddaughter,” Grandma says.
“And once a month isn’t nearly often enough. It’ll take forever to get to know him, only seeing him every four weeks.” I cross Mr. Rogers off the list. “Next: oh, I remember Dr. Piotr! But you’ve hit rule number two of dating, Grandma—never go after a man who’s emotionally unavailable. If Dr. Piotr still loves his ex-wife, you’ll only be signing yourself up for heartbreak.”
Grandma rubs her chin. “Well, a man can…”
I hold up one finger. “I sincerely hope you are not about to say ‘change.’”
“Umm,” says Grandma, watching me cross Piotr off the list.
“And finally…” I read on. “Oh, Grandma, no, no, no. Arnold from next door? Jackson Greenwood’s stepdad?”
