by Gill Paul
‘I’m sure you do,’ I remark.
Another silence hangs like an odour between us. ‘Come on, Sal. You don’t think anything’s going on, do you?’
‘I don’t know, Michael,’ I say coolly.
‘Jesus, I only called to see what you were doing today. There’s this film I thought you might like to see – Bulgarian, subtitled obviously, shot with a hand-held camera in black and white. Meant to be amazing. I know it’s not the kind of thing you’d see with Lisa or Kev but I thought you might find it interesting …’
I would rather impale myself on that plumbing sculpture. And that’s when it hits me: of course I don’t believe that the flowers were for some poor, loveless girl at the radio station. More importantly, I don’t care enough to let him know. ‘No thanks,’ I say, ‘I’ve got loads of other stuff to do.’
‘Christ, Sal, what’s got into you today?’
‘Nothing,’ I snap. ‘Nothing at all. But please don’t bother calling me again.’
*
‘The thing is, Mum,’ Riley says over breakfast, ‘one of Zoe’s housemates is leaving next month so it make sense for me to move in.’ He is avoiding looking at me and has barely touched his scrambled eggs.
‘But …’ My heart seems to slump. ‘… You wouldn’t be taking the empty room, would you? I mean, you’d be sharing with Zoe – at least, I assume you would – so she’d still have to find a new housemate.’ I clear my throat and sip my tepid coffee.
‘Yeah, well, I could help her find someone. I mean, there are loads of people at college who are desperate to move out —’
‘Desperate?’ I repeat.
Riley fiddles with the ketchup bottle. ‘I mean, get their own place. You know. Be independent and do their own thing, like you did when you were my age.’ He smiles hopefully and drains his own coffee mug.
‘Yes, I s’pose I was. I was living with your dad by the time I was twenty, but only because it was cheaper that way and I had nowhere else to stay and —’
‘Mum, you wanted to be with him,’ Riley interrupts with a smile. ‘You didn’t want your mum and dad doing everything for you anymore.’
I nod, unable to argue with his reasoning. ‘But how would you afford the rent, hon? I can help you out a bit but I can’t cover it all …’
He sniffs loudly. In his towelling dressing gown, and with his light brown hair all mussed up, he still looks like my boy. Hardly seems like any time since we sat building Lego spaceships on the living room carpet together. ‘You don’t need to help me, Mum. I’ve got some shifts at that French place. Just basic stuff, kitchen portering and I’m sure it’ll be awful. But they reckon I’ll soon move up the ranks …’
‘Oh, darling, you never said!’ I reach across the table and grasp his hand. ‘I’m really proud of you, you know. But you seem so young, the two of you, to be moving in together. I mean, it’s a massive step …’
‘It’s not really like that,’ he says quickly. ‘It’s more of a house share really. It’s just, y’know, I’m gonna be twenty this year and I feel, I mean, you’re great and everything, and I know you went out last night to give us some space but …’ He smiles hopefully. ‘Don’t you want your own space as well?’
I am momentarily stumped for words. But then, as I make a half-hearted attempt to finish my breakfast, something surprising starts to happen.
He’s right, I realise. Riley wants to broaden his horizons. Not in an improving himself way, but because it’s precisely the right thing to do at his age. He doesn’t want to have to ask me to go out for the evening so he and Zoe can be together. He wants that all the time, with no negotiations required. I realise, too, that I can’t expect him to hang around just because I love him being here.
‘I won’t be far away,’ Riley adds, as if reading my mind.
‘Yes, I know, darling.’ I smile as he gets up to clear our plates and then, without any prompting, does the washing up. A small thing, I know, but he’s trying to make everything all right. ‘Is this what you wanted to discuss with Zoe last night?’ I ask.
His fringe swings into his eyes as he nods. ‘Yeah.’
‘Well, if that’s what you want to do, then it’s fine with me. But you’ll have to ask your dad to help you move your stuff, okay? I won’t be much help with my bike.’
He sniggers and, although there’s no awkwardness that I can detect, I am overcome by an urge to get out of our house, to allow myself time for Riley’s announcement to sink in. So I go to the gym, whose door I haven’t darkened in months, and throw myself into the Sunday morning spin class, followed by a swim. In the steamy shower afterwards, I replay last night’s events in my mind.
Just drinks in the pub, nothing special. But the best evening I’ve had in ages.
As I leave the gym, I call a couple of regular clients who’ve been asking me to do home visits. Back at home, I pack my kit into my bicycle panniers and cycle to Ellen’s ground floor flat across town; housebound and elderly, she places great importance on her regular manicures. I thread Juliette’s brows at her house nearby; with newborn baby twins, it’s impossible for her to get to the salon. ‘Thanks for making me feel human again,’ she exclaims, as I get ready to leave. Normally, I try to avoid working on my days off, as I’ve always figured it was more important to spend time with Riley than to bring in a little extra cash.
Now, of course, he no longer wants or needs me hovering around. He knows what to do with fresh thyme and scallops, for goodness’ sake. Well, that’s fine and healthy and probably preferable to the two of us hanging out together watching TV when he’s 37 years old (although, if I’m honest, I’d love that too). My boy is all grown, and I’m proud of him. I guess it means I haven’t done too bad a job.
My last stop today, on my way home, is Wild at Heart in the town centre. In my pocket is an envelope containing a note, which reads:
Hi Jamie,
Really enjoyed meeting you last night. Sort of change of plan with the flowers man. He’s not around anymore. So I wondered, would you like to meet for a drink sometime?
Sally x
I pause at the closed shop door, my heart hammering with nerves. I have never done anything like this before. But then, wasn’t Michael always on at me to be open to trying new things?
Putting off the moment of posting the card through the letterbox, I pause to glance into the shop window. The Valentine bouquets are looking decidedly dated now, the way Christmas decorations do the instant the festive season is over. Tomorrow they’ll be gone, to be replaced by the usual display of blooms arranged so casually, yet beautifully – something I have never managed to master.
A movement in the shop catches my eye. Someone is in there, heading toward the window. Christ, it’s Jamie, about to spot me lurking here on the pavement. Talk about weird, stalkery behaviour. I freeze, glancing at my bike, wondering if I could throw myself at it and cycle off without being seen. But too late. He’s right up at the window now, lifting an enormous bouquet of red roses. His gaze meets mine. ‘Sally?’ he mouths, eyes widening.
I stand, as if caught in headlamps, on the pavement. He dumps the flowers and hurries to the shop’s entrance.
The door opens. ‘Hey, lovely to see you again,’ he says, with an enormous grin.
A pause hangs in the crisp February air. ‘You too. I, er, thought I’d drop by, although I didn’t think you’d be here on a Sunday. You see, erm … things changed with the flower man.’
‘Really?’
I nod. ‘Turned out they weren’t for me after all and —’
‘Oh, no!’ He feigns disappointment, and I laugh.
‘… And I don’t have your number,’ I babble on, ‘so I thought I’d drop you a note. Very old-fashioned, I know …’
His smile makes my heart turn. ‘I think that’s a lovely thing to do. So, um … what does it say?’
I push back my hair distractedly. ‘It just says, maybe you’d like to meet me for a drink sometime.’ I clear my throat and muster a big,
bold smile. Yes, this is embarrassing. It also happens to be far preferable to being a work in progress.
‘I’d love to,’ Jamie says. ‘To be honest, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since we all left last night. Kev knew, you know, when he tried to set us up —’
‘He set us up?’ I repeat.
Jamie smirks. ‘Well, sort of. You know how he likes to meddle. He told me about you and mentioned that you were seeing someone, but said he was a jerk, that he couldn’t understand what you saw in him —’
‘He’s outrageous!’ I exclaim.
‘… And that’s why he miraculously recovered last night, when he heard I was getting together with Daniel and Stu. “I’ll come,” he said, “and I’ve got this friend, Sally, who’s at a loose end tonight …”’
I snigger. ‘That sounds great, doesn’t it?’
He grins again, sending a fluttering of butterflies in my stomach. ‘It does, actually. So shall we go out? After I’ve finished in here, I mean? I said I’d drop in today and clear the decks. Sue hates the place looking Valentiney after the big event …’
‘Understandably,’ I say.
Jamie laughs and brushes bits of foliage from his sweatshirt sleeve. ‘Shall we meet for a drink in the King’s Head around seven and see where looks good for dinner?’
‘Sounds great,’ I say, figuring that Riley and Zoe will appreciate another night alone in our house. But this time, I’m not just getting out of the way.
‘See you then,’ Jamie says. He kisses my cheek, and my heart soars as I lift my bike from its propped-up position against the florist’s, with the card still stashed in my bag.
Thank God Valentine’s Day is out of the way, I decide, with its weight of expectations. We are just two people who want to spend time together on an ordinary night. Who knows where it might lead?
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About the Author
Fiona Gibson is an author and journalist. Originally from Yorkshire, she started her writing life at the age of seventeen on Jackie magazine. She is a regular contributor to Red, Sainsbury’s Magazine and the Sunday Herald, and lives with her husband and their three children in Lanarkshire, Scotland.
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