by Lucy Dillon
‘Paul and I were never serious,’ Rachel began, and then stopped. Paul – a thoroughly pleasant solicitor friend of a friend – had been an attempt to prompt Oliver into some kind of . . . well, she wasn’t even sure what she’d expected. It hadn’t worked. Paul wasn’t right. Oliver knew it. She’d gone back to him before nice Paul had had a chance to get attached.
Oliver. God, he had made her behave in ways she really wasn’t proud of.
On top of the chest, on a lace runner, was a faded colour photograph that she’d never seen, but she recognised the occasion from the clothes: it was herself, about two years old, in Dot’s arms at Amelia’s christening. Dot was wearing a fashionable tangerine orange trouser suit, complete with trailing headscarf, and she was wearing a pair of tiny dungarees. They were both beaming at each other with great delight, big nose to miniature big nose.
We do both have strong noses, thought Rachel, rather sadly. I suppose I’ll end up with all that white hair too. And the house, full of dogs, and no man, while my sister brings up her kids and organises Boxing Day sherry parties and drives everyone up the wall sending birthday and anniversary cards.
She felt her skin prickle. History was repeating itself. Dot had messed things up with a man, and now she had too. Maybe it was inevitable, a character trait. Like Dot’s isolation.
‘Amelia thinks . . .’ Val began, but Rachel interrupted her.
‘That doesn’t mean I don’t love Amelia, though,’ she blurted out. ‘Just that our lives . . . our lives are very different. She’s got Grace and Jack, and she thinks I’m . . . well, it doesn’t matter. I never know what to say. Just because someone’s related to you doesn’t mean you automatically get on.’
There was another pause on the line, but it was different to the previous ones. Rachel thought she could detect a sigh.
‘Well, exactly.’
She stood still, in front of the big double bed for one, wondering whether handsome Felix had ever pulled Dot to his bare chest in this room. A shiver ran through her.
‘Have you tried in her wardrobe?’ suggested Val, in her ‘changing the subject’ tone. ‘Because now I think about it, you should have a look for some of the jewellery Felix gave her. Some nice pieces there, I’d say, might be something you could give to Amelia and Grace for when she’s older.’
‘But I can’t send them to you until probate’s been granted.’
‘You can look, can’t you?’
Rachel opened Dot’s modest wardrobe, ready for a blast of mothballs and old coats, and blinked at the unexpected flash of emerald and cherry red. Satin and brocade dresses and jackets gleamed from the dark interior, tucked between dark wool suits like jewels in a case. Elegant hat-boxes and tissue-stuffed shoes lined the bottom while drawers of gloves and folded evening scarves filled up one whole side.
Her great-grandmother’s silver-backed brush and mirror set sat at the top of the drawers, stashed carelessly on a box from a Mayfair lingerie shop.
‘Are they there?’ Val enquired, clearly wishing she was there to do the job properly.
Rachel grinned. I bet Mum expected her to have them on the dressing table like a dutiful spinster ought, she thought, liking Dot even more. Not hidden away on top of a gift from her rich lover. I wonder if Amelia would prefer what’s in the box?
‘I’ve found them,’ she said. ‘Tell Dad I’ll look for his Acker Bilk albums this afternoon.’ She pulled out a silver maxi dress that rustled seductively in her hands like snakeskin. It still smelled of Shalimar.
Dot! thought Rachel. What did you get up to before you hid yourself away here? The prospect of beginning the sorting-out process suddenly didn’t seem so bad.
‘Good girl,’ said Val, sounding more like herself. ‘Have you got time off work? They ought to be understanding, what with it being a family bereavement.’
‘Mmm.’ Felix must have taken Dot to some smart places, she thought, stroking the soft velvets and crisp moiré satins. Maybe the same places she’d gone with Oliver.
‘Mum, listen, I’ll call you back, shall I? I’ve got to go,’ she said, making a mental vow to tell Vall all about her resignation next time they spoke.
Then she sank down on the bedspread and read Dot’s letter properly.
Dear Rachel, Dot wrote.
If you’re reading this, then I’m long gone, you’ve seen the solicitor, and now you’re beginning the uphill task of sorting out my house. Poor you! I want you to know that I’ve left you in charge because you’re the only member of our family whom I think really understands secrets. In the course of sifting through forty years of junk, you’re going to come across things that are precious to me – and some of those are secrets I’ve held on to for many years. Not all of them are mine. It’s up to you what you do with them, just as it’s up to you to decide what to do with the house.
Here’s our first secret. I’ve made a bit of a mess of saving for inheritance tax – you’re going to get clobbered. But in the butter dish in the fridge there is a necklace I’ve never worn. Wear it so everyone thinks it’s yours, and then, if needs be, you can sell it. I have a feeling your ‘complicated ’ relationship means the odd diamond necklace here or there isn’t unlikely.
And here’s another. Your mother and I fell out some years back, and she thinks it was her fault. It wasn’t. It was mine, as you might see when you go through the house. If you can find a way of explaining it to her, then I’ll be eternally grateful. I would have explained it to her years ago, but I made a promise that I couldn’t break. Maybe you can.
I hope you’ll find everyone you need in this house. I did. I hope, too, that by the time you read this, you’re more settled than you seemed last time we met. If all else fails, my advice – for what it’s worth – would be to take the dogs for a walk. Even if the answer never comes, you’ve made someone else happy in that time, and I find that counts for something in the bigger picture.
Love, Dorothy
PS Please take good care of Gem. He took great care of me.
Rachel sank back onto the bed, winded by the unexpectedly vivid tone of the letter. It felt as if the younger Dot, not the elderly lady she thought she knew, was in there with her, winking in a conspiratorial manner. Secrets? Where? And how was she meant to find them, let alone parcel them out like silver hairbrushes?
There was a scratching at the door, and Gem’s long nose appeared, followed by the rest of his ghostly body. Without making eye contact he skulked to her side, as if she couldn’t see him, and lay down a few feet away.
Rachel felt cornered, her imagination interrupted. It was like having a toddler following her about – she couldn’t even shower without Gem scratching the door. Was she ever going to be alone here? ‘What do you want now?’ she snapped, then remembered Dot’s note and felt guilty. ‘Do you need feeding? A pee? A quick Sudoku? Help me out here?’
Gem raised his head but made no sound. Rachel clicked her tongue, and got up to go downstairs. Silently, he followed her.
Rachel was relieved to find that Megan and George’s gathering had relocated to the kennel office. The kitchen was empty, and she crouched down to reach right into the back of the fridge, where a Clarice Cliff butter dish was rammed behind many sticky jars of local WI jam.
Rachel pulled it out, sceptical. The more she thought about it, the more it sounded as if Dot had started with Alzheimer’s – necklaces in butter dishes? Honestly?
Half expecting to find a lump of rancid butter, she lifted the lid and her mouth slackened in shock.
Heaped up like any old jumble-sale tat was a collar of fine diamonds, interspersed with sapphires the size of her little fingernail. Rachel sat back on her heels in shock, and held the chilled jewels up to the window, letting shards of pure wintery light dance through onto the paw-marked floor tiles. Her unmanicured fingers felt too shabby to be holding something so lovely and when she put it around her neck she gasped at the sensation of the cold settings against her skin.
Rachel looked at hers
elf in the oven door, pulling her hair back off her neck for full effect. There were thousands of pounds-worth of stones, just lying on her collarbone. There was no way she could pass this off as hers to anyone who knew her – or Oliver. She was a minimalist, and he’d always kept his gifts untraceable: flowers, dinners, cash ‘to treat herself’. This was a flamboyantly romantic gift, a necklace to adorn someone equally precious, given by someone very generous, or very in love.
Rachel wasn’t given to bouts of self-awareness but, for the first time ever, she could have kicked herself for her selfishness. Why hadn’t she taken more time to talk to her aunt? Why hadn’t she built on that awkward but comforting New Year’s Eve? Why had she been so glib as to swallow Val’s version of the bonkers old unloved dog-martyr, even when she was mature enough to see it for what it was – an old family argument gone bad?
Dot hadn’t been quite real to Rachel, growing up so far away; she’d seemed more like a character in a book, surrounded by her dogs and decorated with Val’s mutterings. Only now was Dot starting to come to life, in a bizarrely close shadow of Rachel’s own experiences, and it was too late to ask her anything.
‘Bollocks,’ said Rachel and on cue, Gem slid silently into the kitchen, sitting down next to the hook where his lead hung.
11
Johnny would have guessed something was up even without the five missed calls on his phone. But now, as he strolled round the corner towards their house, he spotted Nat’s Mini parked in the drive.
He did a double take and checked his watch. Natalie was rarely at home before seven at the earliest. It was their running joke, that he was the part-timer who had the tea ready on the table when she threw her laptop bag into the hall well after the nightly news had finished.
Johnny quickened his step. Though she’d rung several times while his phone was off in class, she hadn’t left a message for him, which made him hope for the best. Maybe it was a bedroom summons. According to his vague reckonings (based around Birmingham City home matches) they were entering a critical time; maybe Nat had come home early to waylay him at the door in her beige mac and last year’s anniversary underwear?
That had been something of a highlight a few months back.
Johnny smiled as he loosened his tie and swung his bag of marking onto the other shoulder. If Nat’d now managed to pinpoint her ovulation down to exact hours it wouldn’t surprise him. Last summer, she was the one who’d learned basic Finnish in the time it had taken him to remember the name of their hotel properly.
The front door was open when he pushed it, and he could hear the sound of Hoovering inside.
Hoovering? Now that wasn’t so much like Natalie. Johnny frowned. Maybe his mother had finally cracked and broken into their house to give it the spring clean she kept hinting that it needed. Nat’s calls were for back-up.
‘Nat? Is that you?’ He dropped his school bag by the door and shrugged off his thick coat.
The vacuum cleaner was turned off, and Natalie appeared in the sitting-room door. She was bright-eyed and still wearing her navy suit, but her feet were bare and her bob was messed up with static so it rose in a blonde halo round her head.
‘Are you cleaning?’ Johnny asked, bewildered. ‘But Mrs Landon came yesterday, didn’t she?’
‘She did. But I’m doing it again.’ Natalie trod on the cord winder, and the plug spun back at high speed into the machine, flicking dangerously near her slender ankle. ‘I’ve done downstairs and I’m just going to—’
‘Stop! Stop!’ Johnny grabbed her by the arms. ‘Are you OK? You look . . .’ He peered at her, not sure how she looked. She looked a bit pissed, if he was honest. Her eyes were bright and she was hot. ‘You look a bit flushed.’
Natalie bit her lip and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand.
‘Do you want to sit down?’ Johnny asked, wondering if it had something to do with his sister’s baby news that morning. ‘I think you should. Come on, let me make you a cup of tea.’
He realised he was talking to her as if she was an escaped mental patient, but Natalie didn’t seem to mind as he steered her into the kitchen, and sat her at the table.
There were documents strewn across the table, Johnny noticed, along with various Mr Sheen-type products he didn’t recognise. Cleaning wasn’t his forte; it wasn’t Nat’s either, hence the weekly ministrations of Mrs Landon. He put the kettle on for a cup of tea; his instincts told him to open a bottle of wine, but wine was on Natalie’s hit list for both of them, at least until her period arrived each month.
‘Johnny, I’ve got good news and bad news,’ announced Natalie. ‘Which do you want first?’
‘Er, the good news?’
Her eyes shone with enthusiasm. ‘You know those lovely dogs we saw up at the rescue, the night we went with Bill?’
‘Yes,’ he said guardedly.
‘And you know you’ve always wanted a dog?’
Johnny couldn’t see where this was going. ‘Yes, but didn’t we decide that we couldn’t have a dog while we were both working full time?’ He scanned her face. ‘We did decide that?’
‘I know. I know, but things change, and I’ve been thinking about Bertie, that lovely Basset hound, and anyway, I’ve arranged for Rachel, who runs the rescue, remember?, to come and do a home visit tonight – hence the cleaning – and if that’s OK, then we can take him out for a walk tomorrow, and see how we get on!’ She smiled up from the table, and though she looked happy enough, Johnny felt a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach.
Something was wrong. He wasn’t sure what it was – he wasn’t sure he was ever going to follow Natalie’s much quicker brain – but something was definitely off-balance.
‘Nat,’ he said, ‘what do you mean, things change? What was the bad news?’
‘I’ve rung Bill and he’s going to come with us, because he’s picking Lulu up to bring her home tomorrow,’ Natalie went on, sorting through the papers and banging them against the table top. ‘We don’t need to take anything with us, apparently – they’ve got leads and . . .’
The kettle boiled behind Johnny, but he ignored it. Slowly, he went round the table and sat down next to her, not letting her break his gaze. He lifted the paperwork out of her hands and glanced down at the familiar logo – it was her contract.
Or rather, it wasn’t her contract: it was an official letter about . . . redundancy packages?
‘Nat?’ Johnny looked up at her, and her manic smile faltered. ‘Tell me the bad news. Now.’
She bit her lip. ‘I’ve been made redundant. They’re merging two departments, part of a cost-cutting measure. I’ve got five months’ pay and as many letters of recommendation as I want. Oh, and obviously plenty of time to walk a dog.’ She blinked, hard. ‘I’ve decided that I’ve got to make the best of it. Treat it like a sabbatical.’
Johnny was lost for words. He wasn’t sure what she wanted him to say – this wasn’t the calm reaction he’d have expected from a woman who lived for her job, who treated each promotion like a badge of honour.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘How much notice have they given you?’
‘No notice. I’ve got three weeks’ holiday outstanding, from last year, so they’ve asked if I want to take it now, and finish today.’
‘Today?’ He couldn’t make sense of it. ‘So . . . you’re not going back on Monday? That’s it?’
Natalie nodded. ‘Me and half the department. At least I get my holiday pay. And I don’t have to organise any of the leaving parties, so it’s not all bad news, hey?’
Johnny racked his brains and wished he understood the subtleties of women’s minds better. It couldn’t just be the job that was making her like this – a bit mad. Was this something to do with his mum calling about Becky this morning? But that didn’t make sense – getting sacked and someone else getting pregnant in one day would surely bring anyone to tears?
‘OK,’ he said, standing up and playing for time. ‘Shouldn’t you be a bit more . . . upset? I me
an, I don’t want you to be upset but . . .’
‘Johnny?’ Natalie stretched her hands across the table, so he had to sit back down again. ‘I’ve spent the afternoon being upset. I’ve done upset. I’ve done how bloody unfair it is. I don’t want to waste any more time on stuff I can’t change. I want to do things for us, from now on. Stuff I can change.’
Johnny looked at his wife. She looked so small and determined, like a little girl in her work suit, that he was filled with a desperate urge to make her happy. ‘It’s going to be OK, Nat. If you want to adopt a dog, then great! Let’s do it! Weekends in the park, training, whatever! Fantastic!’
Natalie glanced down and seemed to be gathering herself for a second confession. ‘When I say stuff we can change, I mean . . . Johnny, let’s go to the doctors and have those tests done. I know you’re not keen but I think we should. So we’re not just waiting and hoping.’
‘Tests?’ Johnny squirmed at the thought of waiting rooms and test bottles and Natalie even more keyed up than she was right now. ‘But can’t we just . . . I don’t know . . . take more iron?’
‘I need to know,’ said Natalie. She spread her hands out on the table, and looked at her fingers, with her wedding and engagement and eternity rings sparkling. ‘Every month, I try to do everything right, and I hope against hope that this time, it’ll work, and it’s not. It’s not working. And it feels like I’m failing. Every single month.’
When she looked up, Johnny realised her mascara was smeared, where she’d been crying. He felt ashamed that he hadn’t realised just how miserable it was making her.
‘I just need to know why,’ she said, in a small voice. ‘What’s wrong with me.’
Johnny’s heart lurched. He was so lucky. So incredibly lucky. He didn’t ask for much in life – a wife, a job, a house with a garage, a few pints down the pub with Bill every so often – and he had it all, without even trying. A baby on top would just be a bonus, though he couldn’t really tell Nat, not when she was sitting there, breaking her heart. She was all he wanted.
