‘Good morning,’ flutes the lady, her own nose high above a cheery smile, inclining her head graciously towards Laura.
‘Good morning,’ parrots Laura, amazed that this Ealing Comedy village life is really happening. On towards the shop, and all around, she sees people doing proper things; there is the milkman, beaming as he rattles and jerks down the street in his float, leaping out to place a bottle or two on a doorstep; he waves a greeting at an open window, trills a few whistled notes and blithely performs his ritualised slow dance around the village. In the small front garden of a cottage a young woman pegs her washing on a line slung between two laden apple trees. At her feet a toddler brooms a lorry across the mown grass, crawling to reach windfalls which he places in the lorry’s trailer. Two doors down, the postman opens the gate and rings the bell, balancing a parcel and a handful of envelopes in one hand so he can pat the fat Labrador which appears when the door is opened. Over by the post office a bus idles, and a slow trio of pensioners embark upon the climb up its three steps, assisted by walking sticks and hindered by pull-along trolleys. Their labours are surveyed with sleepy amusement by a black cat sitting in the sun on top of the letter box. There is a loud clopping sound and Laura turns to see a shaggy horse trotting past the shop with a red-faced girl bouncing in the saddle. This is the last straw for Zeus; to him it is not an Ealing Comedy, but is in fact Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and he erupts into tinny, unrealistic barking. The horse screeches to a halt, puts its head down and starts snorting, regarding Zeus with spellbound fascination.
‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ says Laura, automatically expecting blame from the rider for being here at all.
‘Oh, don’t worry,’ smiles the girl. ‘I don’t think she’s ever seen a pug before and—’ The rest of the sentence is left unsaid as the horse squeals, whips round and begins to trot away in the direction it came from. Hot with shame, Laura tries to bundle Zeus under her coat. The girl’s voice floats back to her from beyond the last house of the village. ‘PLEASE DON’T TAKE THIS PERSONALLY, WE THINK PUGS ARE GREAT.’ With a sigh of relief, Laura puts Zeus down again, and tying him to a post, enters the shop.
Laura and Fred quickly establish a routine for their days which owes nothing to the dreary repetitiveness of the school run. Having always assumed that anything that is routine must by its nature be dreary, Laura doesn’t really dare to admit that she is enjoying herself, and lives, as much as is possible for a separate human being, through Fred’s pleasure. Fred is quite unable to believe his luck. He has been allowed a mammoth skive, and his daylight hours are filled with knife sharpening and mass destruction – to mention but two of his top pursuits. He has even received money – a twenty pound note from Betty and a cryptic message recommending him to study hard and ignore adults. Laura, taking this to mean her, is furious, and is only diverted from telephoning Inigo to complain about his mother’s interfering ways when news reaches her that Grass the goat has escaped and invaded the village shop. By the time she and the now very fat goat return, Betty’s iniquities have paled to nothing besides those of Grass. In a sixty-second raid, Grass, in common with those who win a minute to go wild with a trolley, managed to eat four packets of cheese slices, two boxes of doughnuts, an ice lolly, some crisps and a lettuce. She was just starting on a box of tissues when Laura caught her.
Fred, assiduous in his desire to be helpful and good, seizes one of Laura’s many dithering moments and sets himself the Herculean labour of clearing the front garden.
‘It’ll be really good when we have enough flat grass in front of the house to make a football goal,’ he observes, sitting down to lunch with Laura, goose-grass balls and leaves adorning his hair like his sister’s multi-coloured accessories. ‘I reckon it will be some time this year,’ he says serenely, gazing across the bramble explosion that is the area in question, so far only theoretically changed by his hours of exertion.
‘Do you?’ Laura is impressed by his optimism.
As if they have always done it, Fred and Laura divide the dog walking and wood gathering, fire lighting and hanging out of laundry duties without any of the intransigence or martyrdom the family usually specialises in. However, should these useful qualities go unremembered, the telephone rings frequently with messages of stubborn saintliness from Inigo and Dolly.
‘It was Fred’s school’s parents’ evening last night. I went in your place. They said they were having trouble communicating with him. I gave them this telephone number but I had to admit he’s a closed book to me. I blame that ferret,’ is left by Inigo.
Dolly’s are more to the point, and all in texted shorthand Fred has to translate for his mother. TELL DAD I ALWAYS GET MONEY FOR LUNCH NOT SODDING LUNCH ITSELF is followed by SINCE WHEN HAVE I BEEN ON A 9 O’CLOCK BLOODY CURFEW? WOT IS THIS – THE STONE AGE?
A pithy DAD IS A TOTAL S*** is the last message from Dolly for a day or two.
Although it is September, the summer is determined not to end, and each morning Laura is woken by low sunbeams slanting into her room, filling it with amber warmth. Grass is in full milk as usual and a fit of housewifery assails Laura. She spends a depressing evening decanting sour milk into various plastic containers, and is finally rewarded, in the small hours, by the beginnings of a pot of yoghurt. The next morning she phones Hedley.
‘Come to breakfast in the garden, and bring Tamsin before school. I have created some yoghurt.’
‘Christ, you’ll be wearing sandals and growing hairs on your legs next,’ Hedley replies, unconsciously echoing Inigo.
Laura gathers a plate of blackberries, admiring their shoe-shine black gleam as she places them next to the yoghurt in the middle of the table outside. To mark the importance of the occasion, the ferret Vice is wearing a purple ribbon, and Zeus, looking not unlike a giant blackberry himself, has been plumply deposited on a large pink velvet cushion Laura bought at a car boot sale for him.
Hedley arrives alone, and has entered the foraging spirit of the occasion by bringing with him a dead hare. He waves it at his sister, who recoils and edges away, not wishing to kiss either Hedley or the hare.
‘I thought you could make that amazing pasta thing with hare,’ he says hopefully, draping the corpse over the fence.
‘I couldn’t, but Inigo could. Let’s ask him to do it if he comes,’ says Laura.
Hedley looks around uneasily. ‘He’s not coming now, is he? I was hoping for a peaceful breakfast. Especially as Tamsin wouldn’t come. She said she had to meet someone to get a lift with them to school. It must be a boy – she had so much make-up on she could hardly see to get out of the door.’
Fred ambles over. ‘Mum, can we start, I’m starving.’ He reaches across and grabs a fistful of blackberries.
Hedley frowns. ‘You should stop him doing that kind of thing, Laura,’ he scolds.
His sister raises her eyebrows. ‘Why? It doesn’t bother me, and anyway, I’ve had enough of telling people what to do. They never pay any attention and it makes me miserable. I’ve turned over a new leaf and I just don’t care.’
A slow clap behind her and Laura turns to find Guy also laden with provender, grinning. ‘Bravo. You tell them, Laura,’ he says, and holds out a basket full of brown oozing mushrooms.
‘What are you doing here?’ Laura is shocked – she hasn’t seen him for weeks. ‘You’re brown,’ she adds accusingly.
‘Sorry, Hedley told me he was coming, and I wanted to see you – and taste the yoghurt.’
Laura glares, caught offguard, sure he is laughing at her but not sure exactly why.
‘I brought a few different mushrooms because I didn’t know what you liked.’
Hedley interrupts. ‘I didn’t say you could come though,’ he points out, not best pleased that Guy, who is a bit wild at the moment, is already hanging round his sister, and he’s only been back from Greece for a few days.
The pot of yoghurt, always on the small side, seems particularly forlorn when everyone sits down, crowding over it around
the small table. Hedley, Guy and Fred stare at it, then as one, all put their spoons down.
‘I think Guy should fry a few mushrooms as an opener,’ suggests Hedley, and Guy jumps up so quickly that he knocks his chair over. Fred picks it up and follows him into the house, intrigued by the sinister appearance of breakfast.
‘Are any of them poisonous?’ he asks Guy.
‘No, not these ones.’
Fred prods at them with a wooden spoon. ‘Oh, that’s a pity. D’you think we could get some poisonous ones later?’
Left outside at the table with Hedley, Laura leans back in her chair and closes her eyes, seeking the sun’s warmth as it melts onto her.
Hedley coughs and says conspiratorially, ‘Laura, we should talk.’
She opens her eyes to find him leaning towards her across the table, concern and embarrassment expressed in the darting of his eyes and the attention he is giving to the sugar spoon.
‘Are you staying here?’ he says.
‘What does it look like?’ Laura retorts, rude because she is rattled and doesn’t know what she is going to say.
He sighs. ‘You know what I mean. Are you staying for good, you and Fred? And what about Inigo and Dolly and your life in London?’ Hedley gives her a sharp look. ‘You can’t keep the boy out of school for ever, you know. You’ve got to face the music some time.’
‘But we’ve only been here a few days,’ Laura protests. ‘I needed some space and I decided to find it here. The weather’s beautiful and I’m having a nice time. What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing,’ Hedley replies, keeping his voice down because Guy and Fred are coming back now with a plate of fried mushrooms and a loaf of bread. ‘But it would be a mistake to think this is the real thing. It’s an Indian summer and they never last.’
Hedley does his best to outstay Guy, and would have sat all day, bristling like a guard dog, but Gina and her mother are arriving for the weekend, so he has a lot to do.
‘I hope she likes crab,’ he mutters as he departs. ‘I can’t cook anything else.’
Guy and Fred are talking about music as Hedley leaves, or rather Guy is listening, while Fred explains what is acceptable now.
‘You can’t really listen to that stuff any more,’ he says. ‘And it’s usually true to say that if Mum likes it, it’s sad.’
‘Fred,’ Laura protests. Her son holds up his hand. ‘But Dad has good taste. I can lend you a tape he made me. It’s good, it’ll give you a new load of stuff to get to know.’
Guy nods. ‘Good, I could do with catching up.’
Laura laughs at him. ‘But you’ve never been into this kind of thing, have you?’
‘No, but it’s never too late to start.’ His determined expression surprises her, but stops her teasing him further.
Hanging out the washing that afternoon, Laura reaches the final sock and feels the first drops of rain on her face as the leaves on the plum tree crackle with the whip of the wind. The golden morning has fled and a soupy grey light covers the sky. Unpegging the line of damp laundry again, Laura discovers a philosophical calm has come upon her. In the usual scheme of things, it would be infuriating to have to waste her precious time undoing the chore she had just done, but yoghurt-making-country-dwelling Laura seems able to smile to herself and muse that really it’s no more time-wasting than the usual process of hanging it out wet, bringing it in dry, putting it away, waiting for Fred to cake it in filth or Dolly to scrumple it up and chuck it on the floor before Laura (and it is always her, no one else) scoops it up and puts it back in the washing machine. In fact, she could just put all the clothes back in the machine now and save herself and Fred the bother of wearing them.
A crack of thunder breaks Laura’s reverie and she runs to fetch Grass in from the bank where she is tethered, yanking her chain so she trots fast to her shed where rain drums on the tin roof like tiny hooves. Leaving her with hay and a snatched handful of hog weed, Laura heads for the house to shut all the windows. She is guiltily aware that Fred is watching football on television, but comforts herself with the thought that it is Friday afternoon, so even if he was at school it would be almost time to go home now anyway.
There have been no messages from Inigo or Dolly, but Laura’s close inspection of her mobile phone shows that the battery is flat; as Zeus has eaten through the charger there is nothing she can do about it. Trying not to think about the telephone box in the village, she begins cooking a chicken casserole from a recipe on the back of the salt packet. This will put her in a win/win position, she thinks, as Inigo will be impressed with her domestic skills if he comes, and if he doesn’t, there will be enough for her and Fred to eat until they go back on Sunday.
‘We’re going back on Sunday.’ She tries saying it out loud to make it real, but Fred is immersed in a goal replay, and doesn’t hear her; Laura is not convinced that talking to yourself counts as real.
By evening she is almost climbing the walls with anxiety. What will she say and do if they come? What should she think if they don’t? And what on earth will chicken casserole from the back of the salt packet taste like? The rain pours steadily, creating a dimension of claustrophobia for the evening. Laura cannot sit down; she paces the length of the small kitchen. A car idles in the lane and stops by her gate. Craning out of the window Laura can see nothing but the glare of headlights and a silhouetted cloaked figure running up the path, head bowed in the driving rain. It is the wrong height for Inigo, and anyway, there’s no Dolly, not that she would dream of running anyway. Perhaps it’s an axe man? Unlikely, but Laura’s grasp on reasoned argument is slender enough for her to consider this option carefully before dismissing it because there is no sign of an axe. She breaks into slightly hysterical laughter when Guy bursts in through the kitchen door wearing a stiff oilskin cape in which he somehow manages to look like a rakish Mexican bandit rather than ET. He pushes the hood back and finding her manic laughter odd, glances covertly at her mug on the kitchen table, presumably expecting it to contain gin.
‘It’s tea,’ Laura tells him. ‘Would you like some?’
‘No, thanks, I’ve got to go,’ he replies. ‘I need to check the ditches in my field by the stream. The water levels are rising ridiculously and I’ve got sheep in there.’ He kisses her on the cheek and his face is cold and hard. She is horrified by how erotic she finds this moment with him standing there in his oilskins. She had thought she had passed through her crush on Guy and was out the other side now. He hands her a small bouquet. ‘Here, these are the herbs you’ll need for cooking the hare. I thought I’d drop them off now as I won’t be here this weekend, I’m going to a farm management conference in Kent.’
Disappointment lurches through her. ‘Oh,’ is all she manages to say.
‘I should be back on Monday, so I’ll see you then.’ Steam begins to rise from Guy’s dripping cape. ‘I’d better go. I’m soaking your house. Your supper smells good.’ Laura nods, her throat tight, eyes smarting because she won’t be here on Monday. It is ridiculous to be this worked up about going home. Anyone would think she was never coming back.
She mumbles, ‘Yes, I know, I have high hopes for it. Next week would be nice,’ and she waves Guy off down the white-lit path of his headlights.
‘Who was that, Mum?’ Fred’s sangfroid in the face of his father and sister’s possible and imminent arrival is commendable. Laura cannot suppress a small squeak of alarm when he puts a hand on her shoulder as she sits, perusing the classified advertisements in today’s paper.
‘Oooh! You made me jump.’
Fred laughs. ‘You’re mad, Mummy,’ he says affectionately. ‘What’s for supper?’
‘Well, it’s a sort of casserole,’ Laura explains doubtfully. ‘But I think we should wait until the others come.’
‘Are they definitely coming?’ Fred peers into the cast-iron stewing pot, his voice muffled as he sniffs his mother’s culinary effort. ‘Blimey, it smells quite nice,’ he adds.
‘No need to soun
d so surprised. I followed a recipe,’ says Laura defensively, pinging off the walls almost literally, as she searches for a cigarette she knows Hedley left here a few days ago. ‘It will help, it will help if only I can find it,’ she mutters.
Fred lolls against the table, watching her rummage in the drawers, reach up to the high mantle above the Rayburn, then run her hand along the windowsill.
‘What are you doing, Mum?’ he asks eventually.
‘I’m trying to find the cigarette Hedley left here.’ Laura is on her hands and knees with the torch now, craning her head to see behind the kitchen cupboard.
‘I’ve smoked it,’ says Fred.
Laura reaches beneath the cupboard with the broom handle, sweeping it along and creating a small storm of dust and cobwebs which billows out in her face. ‘I can’t see it, but it must be here – you’ve WHAT?’
Suddenly she is on her feet facing him, her heart thumping, legs turned to jelly. Fred has admitted to smoking a cigarette. Her cigarette. Actually Hedley’s. He’s pinched a cigarette and smoked it all on his own without peer pressure. Oh God – if he can tell her this, what deeper iniquities might he be hiding?
Laura feels a chasm open in front of her and Fred speed away on the other side of it. She has no idea what to say. Does it matter? Is it true? Did he like it? Why didn’t he tell her? Why did he tell her? What does it mean? Is she angry? Should she be?
Laura does not ask any of the hundred questions which have popped into her mind. None of them seems the right thing to say. What is the right thing to say?
Green Grass Page 21
