by Gil McNeil
‘Morning, dear. You look peaky, are you feeling all right? There’s all sorts of bugs going round you know. Mrs Denning was only just telling me, that winter-vomiting one is back, and they’ve closed two wards at the hospital so she’s got her mother back home, which doesn’t seem right does it, not at ninety-six? She’s got no idea where she is, poor thing, she calls everyone Nurse, even Mr Denning, and he’s a big man, nothing like a nurse. Promise me you’ll put something in my milk if I ever get like that. Are you feeling sick at all?’
‘No, I’m fine, Gran, and you don’t drink milk.’
‘Yes, but if I was going doolally I wouldn’t know that, would I? Or you could put a pillow over my face. One of those ones off my spare bed would be good, they’re quite firm.’
‘Gran!’
‘Promise?’
‘No.’
‘It’ll set my mind at rest. I wouldn’t want to be making a spectacle of myself. Just promise me, there’s a good girl.’
‘All right. I promise. Now, can we change the subject, please?’
I wonder if you can be arrested for promising to euthanase your Gran with the pillows off her spare bed? I bet you can, especially round here.
She smiles and pats my arm. ‘You do look pale. Are you sure you’re not coming down with something?’
I don’t think I’ll tell her about the electric blanket – I’d only get a lecture.
‘I’m fine, honestly.’
She shakes her head, then looks at the pile of pom-poms. ‘Are you doing the window now? I’ll stop and help if you like. I’m not due at the Lifeboats until later and I don’t like the look of you at all: you’ll probably end up face down in the window if you’re not careful; it’s a tricky job to do on your own. Where’s Her Majesty this morning then?’
‘She’s in after lunch.’
‘I still think you should have told her, she’s got no call pushing herself into photographs like that; she’s always doing it, you know. When they opened the new café along the front she was there, bold as brass, sitting at one of the tables by the door. And she’s never set foot in the place since.’
‘Maybe she wants to be the Zelig of Broadgate.’
‘Well, it’s a flaming cheek, whoever she thinks she is.’
‘Yes, Gran’
She goes upstairs to put her bag in the kitchen, and comes back with two cups of tea, humming Onward, Christian Soldiers.
‘I’ve just been thinking: you haven’t been putting that electric blanket on too high, have you?’
‘I’ll go and see if there are any biscuits left in the tin, shall I?’
After a bit of a struggle, and quite a few digestives, we manage to staple the burnt-orange velvet to the pegboard partition and then I staple the leaves on top, and then prop the tree branch in the corner, with more leaves dangling from it, along with some of the smaller pom-poms. Then I get cramp in my leg and have to clamber back out while Gran goes outside to have a look.
‘It still looks a bit bare.’
‘Yes, but we’re only halfway through. I’ve still got the scarves to fold up and drape over the partition, and then there’s conkers and dry leaves in that bag, and the rest of the pompoms.’
She gives me a blank look.
‘See? Like this. I’ve threaded some of them onto nylon. I thought they could hang in little clusters.’
She’s still not convinced. Actually, I’m not that convinced either.
‘I’ve got to do something with them. Elsie spent hours doing them.’
She sniffs.
Nearly an hour later I’m scattering dry leaves and arranging conkers in little heaps while Gran goes off to get doughnuts from the baker’s. She thinks it all looks lovely, but I’m still not sure: there’s still something missing, only I can’t work out what. And all the dangling pom-poms are really annoying me.
I’m rearranging things when she gets back.
‘Here we go. I got jam ones, I don’t like their apple, they sometimes leave bits of peel on and it plays havoc with my teeth. Shall I put the kettle on?’
‘Thanks, Gran. I’m nearly finished.’
She goes upstairs while I cull a few pom-poms; I’ve decided less is definitely more when you’re talking pom-poms.
‘There, it’s finished. What do you think?’
‘It’s lovely, dear. When will you put the pumpkins in?’
‘You are brilliant, Gran, I’d forgotten about the pumpkins.’
Two large pumpkins and three small ones later, it’s looking more Shades of Autumn, and less Shades of Barking Mad, and we’re standing outside on the pavement having a final check when Mrs Davis comes out to tell us she thinks it’s lovely, and glycerine’s very good for drying leaves, which I bloody wish I’d known before I spent hours drying them on the bottom shelf of the oven.
We go back inside to eat our doughnuts.
‘There’s something I want to ask you, dear, only you must promise to tell me the truth.’
Oh, God. I hope this isn’t anything to do with electric blankets.
‘Of course I will, Gran.’
‘Well, it’s Reg. He’s asked me to go on a little cruise with him, and I think I’d quite like to go, but I’m not sure.’
‘A cruise to France, do you mean?’
‘No, a proper one, Mediterranean Medley, I think they call it, and we’d have separate cabins and everything. They do ballroom dancing, and there’s a show every night, and I’ve always fancied a cruise. You fly to Madeira and then they go round in circles as far as I can make out. What do you think?’ She’s gone rather pink.
‘It sounds lovely.’
‘You don’t think it’s silly, me going gallivanting off at my age?’
‘I think your age is the perfect time for gallivanting, Gran. When would you be going?’
‘Well, that’s the other thing. It’s over Christmas and he needs to know because they’re doing a special price at the travel agents in Margate. I’d be back just after New Year, and it would stop your mother plaguing me to come over to Venice. But will you be all right, with me away?’
‘Of course, Gran, we’ll be fine.’
She looks slightly hurt.
‘If you’re not gone for long of course.’
She drinks her tea.
‘I’ve talked it over with Betty and she says she can sit with the boys on Thursdays and whenever you need her, and she says she’ll come shopping with me: they do whole outfits for cruising apparently, in the shops in London.’
I’m guessing she’s not talking black leather trousers, but I’m not sure I can really see her in white culottes and a sailor’s cap either.
‘I think you can wear what you like.’
‘They dress up in the evenings, Reg says, so I’ll have to get some proper outfits for that. I wouldn’t want to let him down or anything.’
‘You won’t, Gran, you always look lovely. But we can go up to town, if you like. I’ll take you up in the car.’
‘Would you? We could make a day of it, I’d really like that, but can we take Betty too? Only I wouldn’t want to hurt her feelings.’
‘Of course. I’m sure Connie will have the boys.’
She smiles.
‘Honestly, who’d have thought it, me off on a cruise? I better go and tell Reg then.’
She goes off humming, looking very happy, and no wonder; I can’t remember the last time she had a holiday, apart from coach trips with Betty. Mum’s going to be furious; she hates it when anyone in the family does anything glamorous – apart from her, of course – and I think she was rather counting on me to get Gran over at Christmas, even though we’ve all told her she wasn’t keen. Clever old Gran.
Elsie gives the window her seal of approval when she arrives, and is busy showing Mrs Geddings her collection of newspaper cuttings, even though I’m sure she’s already seen them, while I tidy up and re-order some of the cotton we sold at the weekend, and then grab a quick sandwich from the baker’s. There’s a steady but
mildly annoying trickle of old ladies who can’t decide what colour wool they want, and keep getting their wheelie bags wedged in the doorway, and I’m in the middle of looking at photographs of Mrs Bullen’s new great-granddaughter, who’s only six weeks old but is wearing a pink satin hair band and appears to have already had her ears pierced, when I realise it’s ten to three.
I make it to school with only minutes to spare, which means I have to park miles away from the gates and then speed-walk into the playground. I’m standing panting as the kids start streaming out when Mrs Chambers comes over with Jack and asks if I can spare her a minute for a little word. I’m quite tempted to say no, not at the moment thanks, but I’m not brave enough so I exchange an anxious look with Connie and walk towards the classroom, with Annabel Morgan giving me a very supercilious look, and before I know it I’m sitting trying to balance on a very small chair, feeling like I’ve been kept in at playtime while Mrs Chambers searches through a drawer in a large plan chest, looking for the evidence presumably. Bugger.
‘I know it’s here somewhere.’
‘Is there a problem with Jack?’
‘No, not at all. I wish they were all like him.’
Oh, God. It’s Archie.
‘How’s Archie been getting on?’
‘Fine, as far as I know, I haven’t really seen him.’
She carries on searching through the drawer.
‘I had his class for painting yesterday, and he did a lovely picture of leaves, wonderful colours. And a dog. At least, I think it was a dog.’
‘That’ll be Trevor.’
‘Sorry?’
I can’t believe I actually said that out loud.
‘He belongs to our neighbour, but he comes round to play quite a lot.’
She looks at me like I might be one of life’s Very Slow Readers.
‘Here it is, I knew I had it somewhere, I must tidy this drawer, I saw it at the weekend, absolutely fascinating; it’s an article about knitting.’
Christ, what a stupid woman. If she’d only told me this was about knitting I wouldn’t have been sitting here in such a panic. Right, well if this is about me doing a stall for the Spring Fair I think she might be in for a bit of a surprise, because I’m not really up for spending hours wrapping tinsel round bloody jam jars. Start as you mean to go on, as Gran says.
‘Is this about the Spring Fair, by any chance? Because I’m terribly busy at the moment.’
I give her what I hope is a Firm Look, which she meets with a very convincing Firm Look of her own, and to be honest hers is rather better than mine.
‘No, not at all.’
She gives me another Look, and while it’s undoubtedly true that there’s a special kind of pressure which comes from having to face thirty mixed infants every morning, especially if they’ve got paint and you’re meant to be in charge of Art, I do wish teachers wouldn’t always treat you like they’re the busiest people on the planet and you just spend all day lounging about at home arranging flowers and occasionally doing a bit of light dusting. Because some of us are pretty busy ourselves actually, and we don’t get thirteen weeks’ paid holiday a year, with extra training days. In fact we don’t get any training days at all.
She hands me the article, and there’s a big picture of kids in their school sweatshirts waving knitting needles, and my heart sinks. But Mrs Chambers is looking Very Keen.
‘Apparently teaching children to knit improves their numeracy and literacy skills, and there’s an address here, where we can apply for supplies of wool and needles. But I need someone with the right expertise, to help me work out what we’d need, so of course I thought of you. I don’t knit, you see, well not at the moment, but I’m sure I could learn.’
She gives me what I’m guessing she likes to think of as her Encouraging Smile; the sort of smile she’d give you if you were stranded at the wrong end of the wall bars in your PE pants. Bugger.
‘Well, that does sound interesting, but …’
‘I know, isn’t it marvellous? We’re going to be doing textiles throughout the school in the summer term, so I thought if every child could have the chance to knit something, just simple things, little scarves, pom-poms, that kind of thing, it would be wonderful.’
Excellent. More bloody pom-poms.
‘I thought we might try something more ambitious with the older ones, but I’d need your guidance on that, of course.’
‘They could make blankets, and then send them to charity when they’d finished.’
‘What a lovely idea. I knew you’d come up with good ideas like that.’
Double bugger; I walked right into that one.
‘We could put a note up asking for volunteers, so you wouldn’t need to be in school for too much of your time, because of course I do realise you have your business to run. But if you could just help me with the initial planning. We’d need to come up with a programme, so we’re clear what we’re trying to achieve, I do think that’s important, don’t you? Otherwise it could so easily turn into lots of chatting and not many learning goals being met. We need to make some worksheets, so other members of staff can help deliver the target tasks, for the older year groups. It’s so important to rescue traditional crafts and keep them alive for future generations, don’t you agree?’
Christ, she’s good.
‘Oh, yes, definitely.’
‘And avoid the stereotypes.’
‘Sorry?’
‘That only girls knit.’
‘Oh, yes, absolutely.’
‘Do your boys knit?’
‘Jack’s quite keen, but Archie’s not convinced.’
Actually, Archie refused point blank last time I tried to get them both knitting, and then bent one of his needles out of shape by poking it down the back of the radiator in the kitchen.
‘Well I think it’s wonderful, how it’s having such a resurgence. It’s an important art form, you know, going back to the Middle Ages. I’ve been doing some research and it’s fascinating; of course it was mainly men then, making wool stockings and carpets and they had Guilds, so it was all taken very seriously. But it’s always the same, I expect you’ve noticed; when men do something it’s an art, but when women do it, it gets relegated to being a craft. It’s so annoying.’
I’m liking her more and more. Damn.
‘We could make a rug with one group. They could all knit strips and then we could weave them into a mat.’
She beams at me.
‘Excellent. How exciting! Shall I write off for supplies then?’
‘Yes, and I’m sure we’ll have some spare stuff in the shop.’
There’s no point in pretending any more; I’ve been officially signed up.
‘That’s very generous of you. Once I’ve heard back from them let’s meet and start planning, shall we? I have a free lesson on Tuesdays, or after school if you prefer? I’ll raise it at our planning meeting this week, but I know Mr O’Brien will support us. He’s very keen on whole-school projects.’
‘Tuesdays are fine for me.’
Bloody hell. So now I’ve got to add Invent a Whole School Knitting Project to my bloody list, along with Find Cruise Wear for Gran, and Sort Out Jack’s Birthday Party. Christ. So many fabulous things to do, so little time.
Connie’s waiting for me in the playground, looking rather worried. ‘What did she say?’
‘She wants me to start a knitting project in school.’
‘For who?’
‘The kids.’
She laughs.
‘Porca Madonna!’
‘Double porca Madonna, I think you’ll find. Will you help me, when we get started?’
‘Sure, as long as I don’t have to be with Nelly.’
‘Christ, I hadn’t thought of that. We’ll have to fix it so we never get our own kids in our groups or it’ll be chaos.’
We walk back to the car talking about Jack’s party. Connie’s starting a new sideline for the pub, with Mark making cakes for special occasions,
and we’re going to be their first customer. Jack’s birthday’s just a few days before Halloween so he’s making him a giant pumpkin cake. I’ve done quite a few versions of Halloween parties. Last year we had a Vampire Adventure Playground party, which was particularly tricky because half of them were wearing plastic pointy teeth which I had to hold while they went in the ball pool, and then they all got muddled up and Tadzio Holland-Blackman fell off the rope swing onto the soft mats and screamed so loudly three of the girls burst into tears, and Nick couldn’t get home in time. But this year I think I’ve come up with the ideal combination, and we’re having a proper birthday tea, with ten of his friends from school, as well as Nelly and Archie, and then a big bonfire party in the back garden. I’ve invited everyone from the Stitch and Bitch group, and Mr Pallfrey’s volunteered to do the bonfire. He’s going to light a few fireworks, too, only that bit’s meant to be a surprise; he’s been filling buckets with sand and hiding things in old biscuit tins in the garage for days now, and he says Trevor loves fireworks, so someone will be face down in the mud while Trevor drags them round the garden, and I’m really hoping it’s not going to be me. The pile of wood for the bonfire is already enormous, and he’s still got more stuff to bring round, which is slightly worrying, but Tina’s promised to bring her husband, who the boys now insist on calling Fireman Graham, and apparently he can put garden sheds out very speedily if he has to, which might be handy.
‘Mark says he can bring soup, butternut squash, if you like?’
‘That would be great. I thought I’d do baked potatoes and little sausages, and honey and mustard chicken, and salads, but soup would be great. I’m doing ice-cream cones and raspberry ripple ice-cream, too, because they’re his favourite. And then there’s the cake, of course.’
She smiles. ‘He’s making a practice one tonight. So I can tell you tomorrow how it goes.’
‘Thanks, Connie.’
‘It’s not a problem. I love it when he makes practising cakes.’
We do a quick supermarket sweep on the way home, and Archie smuggles cheese strings into the trolley and then throws a complete fit at the till when I refuse to buy them, which causes some tutting from the woman behind us in the queue. He’s still sulking when we get home, but is restored to good humour by sausage sandwiches and salad and a strawberry yoghurt, and then they sit watching telly while I put the last of the shopping away and try to summon up the energy to make a start on the teetering pile of ironing that falls out of the cupboard under the stairs every time I open the door. I’ve just put the ironing board up when my mobile beeps.
