by Sue Margolis
Off the main hall were half a dozen smaller rooms, all of them empty. “I’ve got these rooms earmarked for activities like dance, drama, music, art, filmmaking,” Huck explained. “But right now we’ve got no money for equipment or instructors.”
We went back out into the hall. The kitchen was at the far end, behind a long counter. “Volunteers come in each day to cook lunch for the homeless, but we can’t afford to feed the local kids on a regular basis. I’m desperate to get a breakfast and supper club going. If it weren’t for their free school lunches, some of these kids would actually go hungry. And during the holidays some of them do.”
He introduced me to some of his coworkers. The young men and women—black, white, Asian, mixed race—radiated energy and enthusiasm, which, bearing in mind the lack of funding and the myriad other obstacles, seemed remarkable. I discovered that one or two had been raised there in the projects. By some miracle they had managed to stay on at school, take their exams and get to university. Now they were back, determined to do their bit for the next generation of Princess Margaret kids.
“Oh, and this is Araminta,” Huck said as a girl came jogging over to join the group. “She’s the newest member of the team.”
“You must be Sophie.” Araminta beamed, shaking my hand, which none of the others had done. “We’re all so glad you could make it. Has Huck given you the tour yet?”
I said that I thought he was about to.
“Excellent. There’s just so much that needs to be done, but what with all the government cuts and the new welfare reforms, we’re really up against it. It’s so frustrating because we’re all just raring to get going with new projects.”
Araminta was a slender, blond-haired beauty. She was dressed just like the others—jeans, baggy jumper—but unlike the others she had an accent that made Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge sound like the hired help. How she fit in here with her upper-class grace and charm, I had no idea.
“What I don’t understand,” I said, turning to the whole group now, “is how you all manage to stay so positive, considering you have almost no money.”
The general view was that there was no choice. One particularly earnest girl with blond dreadlocks insisted that things would change. The way forward was to keep trying to raise money and putting pressure on the government. “But to give up hope would be to betray these kids.”
“Hear, hear to that,” Araminta said.
I took the point. We were still standing around chatting, a few of the workers having to break off from time to time to settle disputes among the kids, when I noticed a chap coming towards us pushing a mop. He was sixty maybe, but tall and straight of back.
“Out of the way, if you please, ladies and gents. This floor will not clean itself.” I clocked the lumpy red nose that said alcoholic, the grubby woolen cardigan, the frayed checked shirt and military tie. I wondered what his story was.
“But you’ve already done it twice today,” Huck said.
“I know, but these young people bring in so much mud. It’s their trainers. The soles are so badly designed. Dirt collects in the crevices. Somebody should complain to the manufacturers. I might even do it myself.”
“Sophie, I would like you to meet Pemberton.”
Pemberton offered me his hand. “And that’s not Mister Pemberton,” he said. “Just Pemberton. It’s the way I like it.”
“Pemberton used to be a butler,” Huck said.
“Indeed I did. I buttled for the best, you know … everywhere from Blenheim Palace to Belgravia.”
“And now he helps us out at the center, don’t you, Pemberton?”
“Indeed I do. When I can get on, that is. Now, then, I would be most grateful if you would kindly move to one side.”
We duly moved.
Once the tour was over, we headed to Huck’s car.
“Sorry it’s such a crap heap,” he said, opening the door to an ancient Ford Fiesta that couldn’t have been worth more than a hundred quid. “No point in having a decent car around here. This is easily replaced if the kids decide to firebomb it.”
• • •
Fifteen minutes later we were being shown to our table at Chez Max. I was glad to be in the warm and even gladder when Huck suggested we order a bottle of merlot.
“Whenever I go to nice places, I feel so bloody guilty,” he said. “But I’ve learned that unless you have the occasional treat, you end up with nothing left to give.”
“I get that. Nobody could do the job you do with an emotional fuel tank constantly running on empty.”
He noticed my hands. “God, they’re white with cold. Sorry the heater wasn’t working in the car.” He took one of my hands in both of his and began rubbing. It felt good being touched. Correction: it felt good being touched by Huck.
“Ooh, that feels better,” I said after he’d been rubbing for a minute or so. “I can feel the life coming back.”
He started on the other hand, stopping only when the wine arrived.
“So, what happened to poor old Pemberton?” I asked.
“Booze.” Huck explained that Pemberton had been a drinker all his life. “For years he managed to hide it, but eventually he started drinking on the job. People from the best houses have little time for drunken servants and he got the sack. He’d drunk his savings, his wife had left him and he had no family to speak of. So he ended up sleeping on the streets. He lives in a hostel and we let him help out at the center.”
“Poor man.”
“I know. I think about these people and realize how easy it is to find yourself homeless. Talk about ‘There but for the grace of God’—” He stopped himself. “I’m sorry. Time to change the record. Work tends to get to me and I end up getting maudlin.”
We ordered comfort food: lamb shanks braised in wine with mustard mash. Chez Max didn’t disappoint. It was sublime.
He asked me how my Christmas had been. I found myself telling him about Christmas morning and how I had stood in front of the his and hers sinks in the bathroom feeling sad. “For a few moments, the aloneness was just so overwhelming.”
“I know it’s an old cliché, but you have to give it time.”
“You’re right. People keep telling me the same thing, but I miss us being a family.” Now I was the one getting maudlin. “So, come on, how was your Christmas?”
Huck said that the youth club had been open to the homeless as well as to kids whose drugged-up parents were too out of it to feed them. “It was pretty full-on, but I managed to get home for a couple of days.”
He explained that, until he could find somewhere to live, he was staying with his parents. “Mum can’t believe her luck. Not only am I back from Africa, but I’m living at home and sleeping in my old bedroom. She hasn’t stopped clucking. Don’t get me wrong—I love her to bits and I do appreciate her ironing my pants and socks, but she can be a bit smothering.”
We talked about parents and I told him how much I was missing mine. “And of course my old dad has started having group sex with hookers.” The words were out before I could stop them. I had this tendency to lose my brain-to-mouth coordination when I drank. Huck burst out laughing.
“I’m not kidding. My dad is seeing this hooker named Anita. In a weird way we’re all hoping it’s an aberration brought on by Alzheimer’s. I’m not sure we could forgive him otherwise.”
Huck said he took the point. “So he can still … you know … perform at his age? That’s something, I suppose. I mean, there isn’t a man alive who doesn’t live in fear of ascension deficit disorder.”
“Well, I’m sure you don’t have anything to worry about on that score.” Once again my inner thoughts had made it onto the outside.
“Huck?”
“Yes.”
“Could we pretend I never said that?”
“Sure.”
“So how’s about we order dessert?”
I chose lemon tart. He went for the crème brûlée. We didn’t have to wait long.
“How�
��s yours?” I said.
“Fabulous.”
I watched the guy at the next table load his dessert spoon with chocolate brownie and bring it to the lips of his female companion. A moment or two later, she reciprocated with some creamy meringue.
“The other youth workers seem like a great bunch,” I said. “I can’t get over how enthusiastic they all are. I guess they’re too young for the cynicism to have set in.”
Huck smiled. “Cynicism is something you really have to fight in this job—particularly as you get older. Once it gets the better of you, you might as well give up.”
“Araminta’s not quite what you’d expect,” I said.
“I know. She’s an odd one. If it had been left to me, I’m not sure I would have hired her. Don’t get me wrong—she’s a great girl. She’s super smart, her heart’s in the right place and, believe it or not, the kids there have really taken to her. I think it’s because they’ve never come across anybody like her before. They treat her like some kind of weird specimen. But if you ask me, she’s just biding her time until some banker whisks her off her feet and she can return to the country to sprog. She’s actually Lady Araminta Elphinstone—suffice it to say that she and Pemberton get on like a house on fire. Her dad owns this huge manor house and her mother’s something on a horse.”
“Umm, I can see that an unreconstructed Marxist socialist such as yourself might have issues with that.”
“You know me so well,” he said, smiling.
I sat there feeling oddly relieved.
“So,” I said, “I’ve been having some thoughts about how you could get some media coverage for the youth club.”
First I suggested he have a chat with Greg, who I thought might be able to sell the story to the Vanguard. “I’ll make sure he knows to expect your call.” I also thought it would be a good idea for him to make contact with Judy, an old friend of mine who specialized in charity PR.
“But won’t she expect some huge fee?”
“Yes, but only after she’s raised stacks of money on your behalf. She takes her commission from the proceeds.”
Finally I suggested that life at the Princess Margaret housing projects might make an item for one of the late-night news programs. I gave him the names and numbers of a couple of contacts I had at BBC 2 and Channel 4.
“Sophie, I don’t know what to say. I can’t thank you enough.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Wait until you get a result. Then I’ll let you bring me back here for dinner.”
“You’re on.”
I offered to pay half the bill, but he wouldn’t hear of it. Even though it was barely a five-minute walk to my house, he also insisted on driving me home.
“I’ve had a great evening,” I said as he pulled up outside. “And it was a real eye-opener seeing around the youth club.”
“I hope it hasn’t depressed you too much. And thanks again for the contacts. I’ll let you know how things turn out.”
“Make sure you do.”
We double kissed good-bye. A moment later I was standing in the freezing night air watching him drive off.
Chapter 9
Greg dropped Amy and Ben home first thing on Sunday morning.
“So did you have a good time with Grandma Val?”
Amy shrugged. “It was OK.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Ben came back, dropping his rucksack at my feet. “She never stopped kvetching. She didn’t let us watch TV and she made me wear two sweaters to go out and Dad didn’t even say anything. She’s such a nudnik.”
“Your grandmother is not a nudnik,” Greg said. “She’s getting old. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to upset her. And anyway, you managed to get one of the sweaters off without her noticing.”
The kids never really enjoyed themselves when they went to stay with their paternal grandmother. For the last couple of years, Greg and I had done our best to keep visits to a minimum, but it was hard because Val adored Amy and Ben and loved having them come to stay. The children objected to going on two grounds. First, she fussed over them in exactly the same way as she had fussed over their father. She worried about them being too cold, too warm, too thin. She was forever pressing food on them. “And I’ll cut the crusts off your bread, darling, shall I?”
Then there was the TV issue. Although Val owned an ancient portable, she disapproved of “all the intellectually bankrupt drivel” that was shown and watched very little apart from the news and the occasional wildlife documentary. When she came to stay with us, she was forever pointing out that Greg and I allowed the kids to watch too much TV. This, she opined, would serve only to dull their brains. Despite our protestations and theirs, when Amy and Ben went to stay with her, she refused to let them watch more than twenty minutes each day. Instead, they were expected to avail themselves of her extensive book collection. C. S. Lewis was encouraged. Cartoon Network was not.
“They were so miserable,” Greg said. “I cut the visit short.”
“Dad took us back to Roz’s,” Ben announced. “And I’ve been teaching Dworkin to high-five. She can almost do it.”
“Good for you,” I said, tousling my son’s hair.
“You got time for a cuppa?” I said to Greg.
“I would, but I have to get back.”
“Yeah, Dad’s got to help Roz,” Ben piped up. “She says the house needs a good spring clean. But I don’t understand. It’s still winter.”
Amy rolled her eyes. “It’s just a phrase. You can spring clean any time of year.”
I was flabbergasted—not that Roz, the militant feminist whom I’d assumed until now lived in politically correct squalor, was spring cleaning, and in January to boot, but that Greg was helping her.
“Mum,” Amy said. “Please close your mouth. You look like a fish.”
I turned to Greg. “Run that by me again. You are helping Roz to spring clean?”
“Yes. What’s wrong with that?”
“Well, for a start, it involves cleaning. You know … scrubbing sinks, loos, ovens—that sort of thing.”
“People change,” he said.
“Clearly. So what brought it on?”
“Easy,” Amy piped up. “She told Dad that in her house a conventional gender-based allocation of chores wasn’t an option.”
My flabber having been gasted for the second time in as many minutes, I stood blinking at my daughter. “Excuse me? How on earth did you remember all that?”
“Roz explained what it meant and it just stuck in my brain. And I think she’s right. Men should share the chores.”
“She also told Dad,” Ben said, “that he needed to get his sorry arse into gear. That bit stuck in my brain.”
My jealousy had turned to amusement. I found myself grinning at Greg. “I’m trying to imagine you in a frilly pinny with a feather duster in your hand. I bet you look really cute.”
“Whatever,” Greg said, refusing to engage with my teasing—or even look me in the eye. Was it possible he was actually ashamed of how he’d behaved when we were together?
He said he had to go.
“OK, but remember to wear rubber gloves at all times. You don’t want to become a martyr to dry, chapped hands. They can be murder, particularly in winter.”
“Very funny.” With that, he kissed the kids good-bye and turned to go.
Unable to resist one final tease, I started singing. “Gonna shake and vac, put all that freshness back …”
• • •
Since Amy and Ben were glued to the TV, getting their first cartoon hit in days, I decided to call Annie. I was bursting to tell her about Greg having turned into the Pine Sol Lady.
“She has so got him under her thumb,” Annie said, laughing.
“I think she probably has. And I have to say I take my hat off to her.”
“Oh, stop it. The woman’s a tyrant. Would you honestly want to be like her—bullying your man into submission?”
“Well, it seems to have worked. Pleading and yelling g
ot me nowhere.”
“And bullying won’t get her anywhere in the end. Greg’s no wuss. Right now he’s still in love, but he won’t put up with it for long. One day soon he is going to snap. Mark my words.”
“You reckon?”
“I’d put money on it.”
“Don’t do that,” I said, laughing. “You’ve already lost one bet.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean my so-called date with Huck. You had it so wrong and I had it so right.” I gave her a rundown of the evening.
“So there was no mention of meeting up again?”
I explained that we’d vaguely mentioned him taking me out for a thank-you dinner if he managed to get some publicity for the drop-in center.
“So do you think he was just using you and that all he wanted was to pick your brains about this publicity thing?”
“Not intentionally. The impression I get is that he’s so focused on raising awareness about the Princess Margaret projects he’ll do whatever it takes to achieve it.”
“Well, if you ask me, the man’s a fool and doesn’t know what he’s missing. Don’t let him get to you.”
I told her that Huck was the least of my worries. “It seems like there’s a real possibility we might be going on strike. God knows how I’ll manage for money.”
“Hey, come on. Don’t panic. You know Rob and I can always help you out.”
“I know, and that’s so sweet of you, but I can’t start borrowing money from you guys. Please don’t think I’m being ungrateful. It’s just that I’d be scared it would get in the way of our friendship. I’d hate that.”
“OK, but the offer stands.”
“Thanks, hon. I appreciate it … So, have you spoken to Rob about going back to work?”
“I have.”
“And?”
“And it was nothing as bad as I thought it would be. He wasn’t exactly jumping for joy and he kept going on about how this wasn’t the deal we’d made, but in the end he said that so long as I took charge of finding somebody to take care of the kids and the house, it was my call. I couldn’t believe it. I think he was just glad to find out why I’d been so down. He’d been scared that I was ill.”
