by Gil McNeil
Lulu laughs.
‘She seemed quite keen on you.’
‘Yes, but that soon wears off. Trust me, she’ll be banging on about too much sex on the telly any minute, like I’ve got anything to do what they get up to on Planet Drama. So that was Martin, the man with the tragic haircut. And who is the someone we won’t mention? The wife, I suppose.’
‘Probably. Elsie always hated her. And what was the matter with his haircut?’
‘It looks like his mother does it for him. Gorgeous eyes, though, and great jeans. I love a man in old Levis, and if he’s into carpentry he’ll be good with his hands, which is always useful for helping you get through those long winter evenings.’
‘I’ve known him for years, Ellen, he’s like a cousin or something. It would be too weird, and anyway he’s in the middle of a divorce.’
‘Well, you could help take his mind off it then. Let me give him the third degree and I’ll let you know.’
‘Don’t you dare; he’d probably go into shock, and anyway a dalliance with Elsie’s nearest and dearest is the last thing I need: she’s bad enough already.’
‘True. Oh God, here she comes.’
Elsie brings her tea down with her and starts telling Ellen about a play she watched which was full of Bad Language, and then Martin comes back and starts talking to me about wood and obsessing about shelf widths and drawing me pictures of dovetail joints. I’m practically in a coma by the time he’s finished, and Ellen’s pulling faces behind his back while Elsie serves Mrs Davis, who’s ostensibly come in for some navy double knitting for a school jumper for one of her grandsons who’s got very long arms, but actually so she can tell Ellen she’s seen her on the telly and she thinks she’s very clever, and to tell us that she’s seen the postcard in the window about the Stitch and Bitch Group.
‘My daughter-in-law Tina’s in the shop with me today, Graham’s wife, nice girl even if she can’t cook to save her life, and we were just talking about her wanting to learn to knit, so she might come to your group, dear. I can look after Travis for her, although I’ll have to put my bits and bobs away, because last time he was round he broke two of my glass donkeys.’
Elsie’s standing with her arms folded.
‘Well, I better be off, then, but lovely to meet you all.’
She nods at Elsie and goes out.
Elsie tuts again.
‘I’m sorry about that; I might have known she’d be in. Never misses out on anything, that one.’
‘I thought she was lovely.’
Elsie gives Ellen a disbelieving look.
Lulu starts putting her knitting away.
‘Can we have some lunch soon? I’m starving.’
‘Good idea. Let’s go back and see if the boys are hungry. Have you got everything you need, Martin, all the measurements?’
‘Yes, thanks. I’ll get home and do some preliminary sketches, so you can see the sort of thing I mean, shall I?’
Oh God. Preliminary sketches? I just want some simple shelves, not something that requires technical drawings.
‘That would be great. I’ll see you on Monday, Elsie. I’ll drop the boys at school and be in around ten. Mrs Brook might be in later for that blue cotton, it’s all ready in a bag, behind the counter.’
Elsie’s looking happier as we’re leaving, and Ellen does her Grand Exit routine and kisses her, and Martin, who looks as if he might pass out.
‘Lovely to have met you.’
He mumbles something and starts backing towards the stairs.
‘Bye, Elsie.’
We walk along the high street giggling like nutters.
‘You shouldn’t have done that, Ellen. The poor man, it’ll probably take him all day to get over it.’
‘What, kissed Dovetail, do you mean? It was very useful research, if you ask me, and he smells very nice, sort of pine with a hint of lemon. You should definitely reconsider, darling.’
‘Stop it. He’s doing preliminary sketches of shelves. You heard him.’
‘He was a bit Rain Man I suppose. Shame. Nice eyes. I like green eyes on a man. But what with the tragic hair thing maybe you’re right. Bugger. I thought I’d found you someone to play with. Let’s go to the pub for lunch and see if we can’t dredge someone else up. I’m still thinking Captain Birds Eye – there must be someone under sixty around here who goes fishing.’
‘Well if there is I don’t want him dredged up, thank you very much. I’ve got quite enough on my plate without any mad fishermen. God, you’re like some demented matchmaker trying to pair everyone off.’
Lulu laughs.
‘I wonder what the boys will be doing when we get home?’
‘Lying on the sofa surrounded by chaos and trains, probably. Although you never know, maybe they’ll have prepared a light but nutritious lunch and the magic fairies will have tidied up all the train track.’
Ellen puts her arm round my shoulders. ‘How long have you been having these delusions, darling?’
‘Well, they might. I’m looking on the bright side. The Stitch and Bitch Group might be a huge success and Elsie might stop tutting, and Martin might make the shelves without giving me any more Top Wood lectures. And there might be so many customers in the shop we have to get a second till.’
‘Yes. But in the meantime I think the pub’s a top plan. I’m craving a vodka and tonic with lime and lots of ice.’
‘Okay, let’s go home and see the extent of the damage, and then adjourn to the pub.’
‘Finally, a plan I can really get behind.’
Chapter Four
Stitch and Bitch
‘Where’s your book bag, Archie?’
He gives me a puzzled look, like I’ve asked him to find the lost city of Atlantis.
‘You had it last night, love, when we did your reading. Where did you put it after that?’
Another blank look. Brilliant; we’ll have to play Hunt the Book Bag while I covertly try to finish making two packed lunches without anyone realising it’s cheese again.
‘Go and look by the coats, and hurry up with your Weetabix, Jack, for heaven’s sake.’
‘I hate cheese. I really do.’
Bugger. Archie’s crept up behind me again.
‘Just find your bag, will you please.’
He wanders down the hall, muttering, looking for all the world like he’s got hours to spare, whereas in fact we’re on the verge of being late. They’ve only been at the school for a month and we’ve already been late twice, three times if you include the morning it was foggy, but everyone was late that day so I don’t think it counts. But they’re much more relaxed about red-faced parents running in as the bell’s ringing than our old school was, thank God, although it still makes me feel like a crap mother, especially when the head, Mr O’Brien, is in the playground, looking young and perky in his corduroy trousers and baggy jumpers, being trailed by a gaggle of children. He’s always surrounded by children, he’s like the Pied Piper, only without the rats.
So far the new school’s been a big success. The teachers are lovely, especially Archie’s Mrs Berry, who goes in for dangly earrings and lots of bangles, and clinks when she walks. Her classroom’s pretty chaotic, but all the kids seems happy, and Archie’s reading is definitely improving, so she gets top marks as far as I’m concerned. Jack’s Mrs Chambers is less clinky, but she seems just as popular, and she does art for the whole school so her room’s full of paintings and tin-foil sculptures, and she’s got clay in her room, which Jack adores. So all in all they’ve both settled in remarkably quickly, which is a big relief.
Archie’s finally tracked down his book bag and is sitting on the stairs, waiting for me to do his shoes up, even though they’ve got Velcro straps which he can do himself. There’s a mini scuffle as Jack starts up the stairs to brush his teeth, and then the yelling starts.
‘He did that on purpose, he did, Mum, tell him, he treaded on me on purpose.’
‘I did not, he won’t let me get past, stu
pid fat baby. Move.’
‘Jack, stop it. And Archie, do your shoes up.’
Jack glares at me. ‘It’s ridiculous, that’s all. Just ridiculous.’
He stomps off upstairs and then comes back down with toothpaste all over the front of his sweatshirt so I do a quick spot of dabbing with a damp cloth while we’re putting our coats on.
‘Mum, Ben Taylor says my anorak makes me look like a minger.’
Archie’s busy having a hopping competition with himself, but pauses, balanced on one leg, ready to defend his brother against enemy forces disparaging his anorak.
‘Well, Ben Taylor’s a minger. I’ll tell him for you, if you like. I’ll go right up to him and say, “You’re a minger,” and then run away. I can run really fast, you know. I can run like the wind.’
Jack grins. ‘Yes, I know, you’re quite a good runner for your age.’
Archie hesitates, not sure whether ‘for your age’ is a put-down, until Jack smiles at him.
‘Yes, I am.’
I’m still trying to work out if ‘minger’ is as rude as it sounds, and needs to join our banned-and-never-to-be-heard-again list.
‘I think Ben sounds very silly, and you should ignore him.’
They both look at me and roll their eyes.
‘You can’t ignore him, Mum, or he’ll just keep doing it, it’s like Archie and Harry.’
‘Come on, let’s go. We need to walk quickly today, so no looking for conkers or we’ll be really late. And what’s like Archie and Harry?’
There’s a silence as I close the front door.
‘Jack, what’s like Archie and Harry?’
‘Harry just kept being horrible to Nelly all the time, that’s all. He kept calling her Nelly Belly. But now he’s stopped.’
I’ve got a funny feeling I’m not going to like this.
‘What did you do, Archie?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Archie.’
‘I just pushed him a little bit, and he fell right over, on purpose. And Nelly gave me some of her biscuit, and it was chocolate.’
‘Archie.’
‘And then he cried, but he’s a big baby and it was only pretending crying. And we had to sit on the mat and Mrs Berry said it was horrible to call people names and he mustn’t do it again. And you mustn’t push people or they can get hurt, and I had to say sorry.’
‘Right, well that’s right, because you could really hurt someone, pushing them. And did you say sorry nicely? Hold my hand now, while we cross the road.’
‘No, I didn’t. I said I was sorry he fell over but I wasn’t sorry I pushed him because calling people Nelly Belly was much more horribler than a little old push, and he’s a big baby for fussing. And if he doesn’t want to get pushed he should shut up calling people names. And Mrs Berry smiled, I saw her, and I got a sticker in painting, for Good Trying, but I got a hole in my paper and everything, so I think it was for pushing Harry really.’
‘I’m sure it wasn’t.’
Actually, I’m pretty sure it was.
‘The best thing to do when someone calls you names is just ignore them. They’ll soon stop when they see you don’t care.’
‘Yes, but Nelly did care.’
I don’t want to encourage him in his role as self-appointed playground enforcer; he’s already got quite enough of the Vinnie side of the Jones family gene pool to be going on with, even if it is sweet of him to defend Nelly like that.
‘Try to be extra friendly today, to show you’ve forgotten all about it.’
‘But I haven’t.’
‘Archie.’
‘Oh, all right.’
A very small girl is ringing the bell so enthusiastically she’s almost falling over as we walk through the gates; they don’t go in for the rather brutal lining up in the playground in total silence thing like our old school used to favour, so stragglers can merge in with everyone else instead of doing the walk of shame across a silent playground. There’s a great deal of cheerful milling about, and you’re allowed to go inside with them and help hang up their coats, which seems to lead to much less stress and far fewer tears in Reception, so I don’t know why all schools don’t do it; it’s so much friendlier. But I suppose not all of them are interested in being friendly as long as their test scores are high enough.
Connie’s waiting for me in our usual spot by the bench under the big conker tree, as Jack and Archie go straight into their classrooms. Having Marco as a ready-made friend has really helped Jack a lot; he was so nervous on the first morning he couldn’t eat any breakfast, even though I’d made his favourite toasted bacon sandwiches. Archie had three, and seemed completely relaxed; he plays with Nelly every lunchtime, especially Narnia, their new favourite game – Nelly’s either the Witch or the Lion, and Archie’s usually the Wardrobe.
There’s a last-minute flurry of people arriving, including two small girls who arrive on their bikes and refuse to get off, and a girl from Archie’s class who he calls Nettle, which can’t be right. She’s having a last-minute ponytail adjustment when one of the big boys arrives with his leg in plaster, with his two younger brothers trailing behind him and doing impressions of his limp; he stops every few steps and turns round and they freeze, like they’re playing a new version of grandmother’s footsteps, and he gets more and more annoyed with them until Mr O’Brien comes over and the two shadow limpers start walking normally again.
Connie laughs. ‘Look at the little one, he’s doing it again.’
One of the toddlers has just been retrieved from Reception, which he tries to infiltrate most mornings. He tends to get very narky with his mum when she brings him back out, and he’s sitting down in the playground and taking one of his wellies off this morning, to stress quite how irritated he is.
His mum sighs. ‘Sam, please don’t do that. Let’s put it back on.’
He takes his other boot off, and chucks it as hard as he can. It’s easy to forget just what total nightmare toddlers can be; you only remember all the chubby kisses but forget the constant battles and ear-splitting shrieks, it’s like post-traumatic-stress disorder, but in reverse. Connie retrieves the welly and takes it back to him, and says something in Italian, which I’m guessing is along the lines of Aren’t you a little bugger? but it sounds so lovely she gets rewarded with a cheeky smile. Maybe we could start a new trend: swearing at your child in a foreign language. Nobody would know, and you’d get to unburden yourself without feeling like someone was going to call Social Services. I think it could be a real winner, and I’m definitely going to get her to teach me a few handy phrases.
We’re walking towards the gate when I notice a woman heading our way holding a pile of pamphlets, wearing a sensible navy skirt and loafers, and a padded puffa jacket with a silk scarf knotted over pearls. Christ, I hope she’s not another über-Tory out recruiting. I’ve already had one in the shop, asking me to join the local Conservatives Mean Business, or Mean Conservatives in Business or whatever they call it, and the only way I could get rid of her was to out myself as a lifelong Labour voter, so now she keeps popping in with annoying and vaguely racist leaflets and trying to convert me; I think they probably get a special merit badge if they convert people to the Right Path. Or possibly a rosette.
She smiles at us, but it’s a rather scary smile.
‘I’m Annabel Morgan, and I’m president of our PTA.’
Oh, thank God for that.
She hands us each a leaflet.
‘I’ll be more than happy to answer any questions. This is my fourth year as president, so I know about most things, if I do say so myself. The committee were so insistent I felt I had to stand again, although I would have been more than happy to let someone else take the reins for a while, more than happy. It’s a great deal of work, as I’m sure you can imagine, but we all have to do our bit, don’t we?’
There’s something about the way she talks that makes you think she’s probably moved heaven and earth to keep hold of her presidency, and what�
�s more she’d knock you flat with a bulldozer if you tried to stand against her. I think she’s probably one of the I’m-a-very-important-person PTA types, who are always telling you how busy they are, and tend to have unpleasant children, who you start out feeling sorry for, for having such an appalling mother, and end up wanting to hit with a bean bag. There are nice PTA people, of course, who make cakes, and spend ages sorting through lost property and covering all the books in the library in sticky-backed plastic. They’re usually the ones who end up volunteering to drive leftover kids home after parties; who funnily enough often turn out to be the kids of the Very Important Types, who are just too busy being Special to remember to pick them up.
‘It’s not obligatory, of course, but we do like to welcome new parents and ask them if they’d like to join us. We’re raising money for more IT equipment at the moment, which is so important, I’m sure you’ll agree.’
‘Oh, yes, definitely. I’ve been meaning to find out about the PTA. How much is it?’
‘Ten pounds a year.’
‘I’ll bring the money in tomorrow then. I can’t promise much in the way of help during school time, because I’ll be busy in the shop, but I’ll certainly do what I can.’
‘Oh yes, you’re Mary Butterworth’s granddaughter, aren’t you, from the wool shop, with the wonderful new window display?’
‘Yes.’
‘So clever. Although I do tend to pop up to John Lewis when I’m knitting for Harry. I only like to use pure wool – he has such very sensitive skin.’
‘Well, come in next time you’re passing, because we’ve got lots of new stock in.’
She smiles, but in a way that makes me feel like I’ve just knocked on her front door and tried to sell her a packet of dusters.
‘Actually I did want a little word, on another subject, if you’ve got a moment.’
She looks rather pointedly at Connie.
‘This is Connie Maxwell. She and her husband have just taken over the Anchor.’
She nods at Connie. ‘I hear the food’s rather good now. We must book a table soon.’
There’s an awkward silence, and she looks at Connie as if she were a waitress who’s lingering too long at her table.
