Poppy Jenkins

by Clare Ashton

  “Not again.” Poppy groaned, aware she was also enjoying a warm glowing feeling.

  She breathed in, composed herself and allowed the heat of her cheeks, and elsewhere, to dissipate.

  Poppy stepped forward with an amble she hoped suggested a business-like manner and ignorance of anybody supine on the river bank, no matter how attractive and half-naked, with breasts that were to Poppy’s mind, irresistible erotic heaven.

  “It’s Rosalyn.” Pip ran back and was grinning from ear to ear. “Rosalyn!”

  “Stop,” Poppy spat. “Pip. Stop it.”

  “Rosaaaaaalyyyyyn!” Pip was waving and leaping up and down with the gusto of a sister who’d found her sibling’s Achilles heel.

  Poppy blushed and tried to avert her gaze as Rosalyn jumped to her feet, let down her shirt and buttoned over her bra.

  “Morning,” Poppy blustered, trying not to steal a last glimpse of Rosalyn’s cleavage. She raised her hand in nonchalant greeting and tried to contrive the appearance of someone not distracted by a luminous barely dressed woman.

  “See you by the bridge,” Pip yelled.

  Oh no, they were near the footbridge. They would have to actually talk if Pip persisted.

  “Pip, I think we should leave Rosalyn in peace. She was having a beautiful,” sinfully beautiful, “repose by the river. Let’s move along shall we?”

  “Stay there,” Pip shouted to Rosalyn. “We’re coming over.”

  Great. Just great. And by the look of horror on Rosalyn’s face, she clearly thought the same. Which was also, just great.

  Rosalyn had reached the path by the time the sisters crossed the bridge and stood waiting for them, her demeanour stiff and her face pale.

  Poppy stopped, remembering David Thorn, and guessed at the underlying cause of Rosalyn’s demeanour. She recalled his altered health and Poppy clasped at her necklace, a nervous tick when she was anxious.

  The necklace. Her earlier defiance gone and not wanting Rosalyn to spot the beloved item, Poppy pinched open the clasp and bundled the jewellery into her pocket. She approached with more respect and soon she faced Rosalyn.

  “Good morning,” Poppy offered.

  “Hello again.” Rosalyn frowned and nodded to Pip.

  They were silent.

  Poppy wracked her brain for a subject that didn’t betray her meeting with David Thorn, reveal her tenderness about the past, or sound stupid and tiresome.

  “It’s, um, it’s a lovely morning for a walk,” she said and Poppy mentally rolled her eyes for failing the last criteria.

  Rosalyn’s response was all of, “It is.”

  And they were silent again.

  Poppy deflated inside and stared at the pebbled path. Seconds passed. Minutes may have crawled by. However much time it was, she felt all of its excruciating passing.

  Rosalyn shuffled. “I should get home.”

  “I’m sorry to hear about your father,” Poppy blurted and she mentally gave herself a good boot for mentioning David Thorn.

  “I didn’t realise you knew.” Rosalyn blanched. “That is, I didn’t think it was widely known.”

  “I’m not sure it is,” Poppy said gently, “but you know what it’s like round here.”

  “Yes I do. You can’t change your brand of bread without everyone expressing their opinion ad nauseum. So how would something as juicy as David Thorn’s stroke go unnoticed?” She’d turned away and Poppy couldn’t decipher her expression.

  “I’m sorry nonetheless,” Poppy said. “I like your father very much.”

  Rosalyn scowled and hesitated before saying, “Thank you. I think you at least do mean it.”

  “Of course. He was always lovely to me. I thought he was an astonishing and very likable man when I was growing up.”

  “I’m glad you think so.”

  And they were quiet again.

  Pip fidgeted by Poppy’s side, but had the good grace to hold her tongue.

  “Well, we’d better get going,” Poppy said, the conversation stalled. “I hope he’s making a good recovery. Please pass on our best wishes.”

  Rosalyn nodded but remained silent.

  “Come on, Pip. Let’s get to school.”

  Pip tugged at her arm and shuffled, eager to divulge something. “Can I ask? Just one thing?” She raised her biggest, begging, round-saucer eyes up at Poppy. “Please.”

  “What is it?”

  “About the hut?” Pip whispered.

  “What hut?”

  “Rosalyn will know.”

  “Rosalyn? You want to ask her about a hut?”

  Rosalyn stared after them.

  Pip beamed and twirled from side to side. “We were talking about you the other night.”

  “Pip!” Poppy shot her a look that clearly said shut up, but Pip feigned incomprehension.

  “Were you indeed?” Rosalyn said. Her voice had thawed into amusement.

  Poppy looked away, not sure if she wanted to witness what was coming next.

  “Yes,” Pip said with enthusiasm. “They said you were trouble.”

  “That’s not what I said,” Poppy added.

  Rosalyn considered them both. “I imagine I was trouble, in some people’s eyes.”

  “Did you burn down the Brownie hut?”

  Rosalyn laughed. “Well, according to your nain, yes.”

  “But did you?”

  “Ask your mother,” Rosalyn said. Her smile was full of intrigue and she turned as if to walk away.

  “Mum?” said Pip. “I don’t think Mum has much idea about anything.”

  “Oh, she knew me very well. There isn’t much your mother doesn’t know about my childhood.”

  “Really?” Pip looked puzzled.

  Poppy blushed, realising Rosalyn’s mistake.

  The penny dropped for Pip a moment later and she tugged at Poppy’s dress. “I told you she’d think you were my mum. People always do.”

  Rosalyn halted and flicked keen eyes between Poppy and Pip. “You’re not… You aren’t related?”

  “Oh we are, but—”

  “She’s my sister.” Poppy thought it safest to interject. She put her arm round Pip’s shoulders. “My very annoying, not so little, sister.”

  Pip grinned, quite satisfied with the status.

  Rosalyn however, for once, was dumbfounded, her beautiful mouth the shape of a wordless “Oh”.

  “So you’re not… But I thought… Poppy was…?”

  “People do all the time.” Pip shrugged. “It’s because she’s much older than me. And she is old enough to be my mum, and Mum’s old enough to be my nain.”

  “Thank you, dearest Pip,” Poppy said it in a tone meant to silence and which, of course, had nothing like that effect.

  “Poppy should have told you in the village the other day.”

  “Thank you, Pip.”

  Rosalyn still struggled. “I did think… Well, when I saw you with Dai. He had his arm wrapped around you. I assumed you were a family.”

  Pip chuckled. “Not a chance. That wouldn’t happen. No way would Poppy marry Dai. For a start, she’s a—”

  “I said thank you, Pip.” And Poppy physically silenced her sister with a hand wrapped over the mouth.

  Poppy found the perpetual process of coming out easier than most, but she was not in the mood for announcing her lesbianism to Rosalyn Thorn.

  Pip scowled over the gagging hand and looked perplexed in equal measure.

  “You’re not married to Dai?” Rosalyn had given up her retreat and was wandering towards them. She looked humoured and more than a little intrigued.

  “No,” said Poppy, “I’m not married to anyone.” She’d said it for clarity but wished she hadn’t.

  “Sorry. I assumed you’d become pregnant and stayed here, what, straight after university?” Rosalyn laughed at the notion.

  Poppy reddened, half embarrassed at her situation and half in pique. “Well, I did. That is, I did come home after university.”

  “Oh,�
� Rosalyn said again. It was starting to become irritating. “Why?”

  “I had good reasons, but,” she tapped her watch, “we have to go.”

  “You could walk with us,” Pip piped up. She skipped about, energised by Poppy’s discomfort and her own impertinence.

  “I’m sure Rosalyn has lots of things to—”

  “Yes I could accompany you,” Rosalyn said. She slipped on her pair of canvas shoes and fell into step beside them. She had a sparkle in her eyes and a curious smile on her lips.

  “So tell me, Poppy Jenkins, why, of all the wondrous and life-enhancing places in the world, did you decide to stay in Wells?”

  Chapter 13.

  Pip skipped along the river, seemingly content to have been the cause of her older sister’s discomfort. Rosalyn walked beside Poppy, exuding elegance despite her rough-cut shorts and canvas shoes. It was the way she held herself with confident and graceful posture, as if entering a ballroom. She glanced at Poppy, a mischievous smile playing at her lips.

  “Please carry on.”

  Poppy prepared herself. Even if Rosalyn disapproved, she would never regret coming home.

  “It was because of Pip,” she said. “Mum was due to give birth after my finals so I came home. I planned to stay until the baby was a month old and help around the house, or with anything useful. But, it was a difficult birth. Dad was away and Mum had a Caesarean, and she would be the first to admit giving birth in your forties is challenging. I think anyone would have found it overwhelming.”

  She peeked at Rosalyn to see if she understood. “It’s quite an intimate time, when you can’t lift your baby to breastfeed because of the surgery and you need help to bathe. And Mum was happier with me around than Nain.”

  “I can imagine,” Rosalyn said with sympathy.

  “Dad, of course, was eager to help when home. But he’d taken on more work after Mum closed the shop for summer. So, during those first weeks, I became like a second mother.” She shrugged. “It’s such an intense period – trying to keep this fragile and precious baby alive. That was incredible enough to make me stay longer, but Pip started to focus on my eyes, to really look at me.” She paused, emotions welling up in her chest. “Then she smiled.” Poppy beamed at Rosalyn, a tear threatening. “I’d made this beautiful baby smile. She clutched my face and gazed at me with such awe and love, I think my heart must have exploded.”

  “So you never left.”

  Poppy nodded. “I kept saying I’d go after another three months. But I dreaded missing Pip change. She seemed to grow every day – crawling, taking a first step and I swear her first words were ych a fi when Nain gave her broccoli. I couldn’t tear myself away. So I took over the shop and, when Pip started school, we created the café. And I’m still here.”

  Rosalyn frowned. “I should have guessed. It’s the sort of considerate thing you’d do.”

  “I didn’t do it out of duty. I know some folks like Mrs Morgan always credit me with being a good girl and taking care of my mum. But it wasn’t that, not entirely.” Poppy smiled. “It was love. I did it because I couldn’t do anything else.”

  Rosalyn looked uncomfortable. “Still quite a sacrifice though.”

  “Why?” Poppy laughed.

  “What about all those things you could have done? All those places you could have seen. Didn’t you have dreams? A publisher? A lecturer? I suppose your aims changed, but didn’t you still have ambitions?”

  Poppy blushed. She’d never regretted relinquishing hope for a respected career, and it irked that she felt ashamed under the force of Rosalyn’s questioning.

  “You weren’t like them, Poppy,” Rosalyn continued. “You were bright, vivacious; you had so much going for you.”

  “What do you mean, ‘them’?” Poppy asked, piqued.

  “People in Wells. You know the ones. Pupils who went from school to Aberystwyth University and straight back home again to teach in the village school. Girls who were mothers before twenty and grandmothers before forty. Dai, whose family hasn’t moved beyond the shop in generations. The Mrs Morgan Morgans of the world, whose greatest achievements are fungus-free delphiniums.”

  Poppy opened her mouth, but only a gasp of indignation came out. “They’re good people. What’s wrong with wanting a family when you’re young? What’s wrong with living in the place of your birth?”

  “Nothing. For them. But you were better than that.”

  “By whose standards?” Poppy stopped and stuck her hands on her hips. “Whose scale of human worth are we using here?”

  Rosalyn swung round. “You know what I mean, Poppy.”

  “Yes I do, and I find it unbelievably arrogant and it’s also stupid.”

  The uncharacteristic vehemence of Poppy’s rebuke clearly took Rosalyn by surprise, but she had ruffled Poppy too much.

  “You’re like those egotists at my university reunion,” Poppy said. “Seriously, I had to listen to three blokes at my table pontificate about work, salaries and bonuses for a whole hour. Two were barristers and the other a junior minister. They had nothing to talk about apart from work and how much more they earned than everyone else. And of course when they asked about my profession there were roars of laughter. Living in the middle of nowhere? Earning next to nothing running a café?”

  Poppy’s eyes were wide with indignation and vehemence as she spoke.

  “Then after several bottles of wine in the common room, one started waxing lyrical about an old fishing village where he’d holidayed. He idolised the simple way of life and they all agreed they wanted to make it rich and retire to the country, go walking in the mountains, perhaps live in a little village.”

  Poppy threw up her hands in exasperation. “And they didn’t even see the irony.” She stared at Rosalyn. “What is the point of running the whole rat race when I can enjoy that idyllic finish now? Everything I want is here.”

  Rosalyn hadn’t flinched from Poppy’s piercing gaze for a second. Then she laughed. “It’s a nice anecdote. But you’re still missing the point.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  Rosalyn sighed. “I’ll try to say it more delicately. After moving away to university, and meeting brilliant people with minds as sharp as yours – liberal people, hungry for different opinions, ideas, cultures and lifestyles – didn’t you find it suffocating back home? Yes, maybe people want to retire somewhere like this, but when you’re young and adventurous? Didn’t you crave like-minded...”

  Rosalyn paused and a look flickered across her face that Poppy couldn’t quite fathom. Was it anxiety, or guilt?

  “You did say you made it to university?” Rosalyn hedged. “To a good university?”

  A thought squirmed through Poppy’s head, one she didn’t like, but it was hard not to be cynical under Rosalyn’s questioning.

  “Are you trying to assuage your guilt?” Poppy said. “Are you looking for an excuse for why I, in your eyes, failed? One other than you devastating my life in sixth form?”

  Rosalyn blanched, but Poppy was unflinching. “Because, yes, it did set me back. A long way. And no, I didn’t go to the university I intended. But I did ok. And I wouldn’t change those times and my friends for the world. So I can assure you – you didn’t ruin my life. I don’t blame you that I ended up here. If anything, you breaking our friendship helped.”

  Poppy looked away and her heart thumped in her chest. She couldn’t believe she’d said those words, with that much conviction, to of all people, Rosalyn. For all Poppy’s indignation, she still admired and was very much intimidated by her former friend.

  They walked on without speaking, Poppy’s face red with umbrage, Rosalyn’s pale with a feeling Poppy couldn’t discern. The sound of their feet scuffing the dusty trail was deafening in the awkward silence and Poppy expected Rosalyn to turn back at any moment.

  But the seconds passed. And the moment grew longer. They walked on in rigid silence, and the quiet persisted as they approached the edge of town.

  “Poppy?”
Rosalyn said, her voice barely above a whisper. “I’m—”

  “Bore da, girls!” Mrs Morgan Morgan popped up from behind her garden wall and greeted them with a hearty wave and good morning.

  “Bore da,” Poppy said, more brusque than she intended. Rosalyn had managed to ruffle her feathers far more than she could have anticipated.

  “Good morning, Mrs Morgan.” Rosalyn almost sang the greeting with a velvety smooth delivery. Her smile, of perfect teeth and a twinkle in her eye, was a picture of decorum. “You are looking particularly well this fine morning.”

  “Why thank you, cariad. As are you, Rosalyn.” She gave Rosalyn’s long, naked legs a look from toes to very short shorts.

  “Thank you, Mrs Morgan. And how are your delphiniums? I passed them the other day and thought they’d be quite at home in the Shrewsbury Flower Show.”

  “Ah.” Mrs Morgan blushed with pride. “They’re doing very well this year, thank you. I’m glad you noticed. There’s nothing to it really. Nice bit of well-drained soil and fertiliser every spring, and you’re almost guaranteed some fine blooms.”

  “You don’t give yourself enough credit. I’m sure there’s more to it than that.”

  “And where are you lovely girls off to this fine morning? And that young Pip?”

  Pip had long since scarpered from the fireworks, hurtled past Mrs Morgan’s cottage and was waiting at the bridge.

  “I’m walking purely for my constitution and Poppy’s company.” Rosalyn smiled.

  “And you, Poppy cariad? Are you all right?” Mrs Morgan frowned, no doubt concerned about Poppy’s atypical and aloof manner.

  “Thank you, Mrs Morgan. I’m well but a little tired and running late for work.”

  “Well I won’t keep you. Nice to see you, Rosalyn. Please remember me to your parents.”

  Mrs Morgan gave them a cheerful wave which Rosalyn mirrored and they walked on.

  Poppy stared at Rosalyn exasperated. “See. That was lovely.”