Mum in the Middle

by Jane Wenham-Jones

  I’d scribbled my mobile number on one of my work cards. As I tried unsuccessfully to turn the hot tap back on with my big toe I hoped he would call. It felt strange and would probably be awkward with Jinni hating his guts – but Caroline would be proud of me.

  As I thought again about his lips so close to mine, the jolt I got this time was unmistakable.

  I fancied him.

  Chapter 14

  ‘Gabriel wanted to see you last night!’ My daughter flounced into the kitchen. ‘He came back specially.’

  I sighed, keeping my eyes fixed on my laptop screen and the current battle to fit twenty-four desks into a space better suited to sixteen, while I waited for the dishwasher to finish.

  ‘I’m sure he had a perfectly good time with you two.’ The banging of kitchen-cupboard doors had gone on for some time, accompanied by occasional bursts of raucous laughter and the faint strains of the guitar. I prayed the walls were thick enough to have saved Meg and Jim next door from a rendition.

  ‘And do you think,’ I added, teeth pleasantly gritted, ‘when you’ve brought people home, that you could clear up afterwards?’

  ‘Sorry!’ Tilly was still in a nightie and oversized sweatshirt. ‘Ben made one of his monster sandwiches. You know what he’s like.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘It looked like more than one and there were all the mugs left here too.’ I jerked my head at the machine gurgling away. ‘That’s nearly done. You can empty it.’

  ‘Okay. Don’t be such a grump.’

  ‘Did you get the name of a plumber?’

  ‘I forgot.’

  ‘For God’s sake, Tilly. Go and see Jinni now.’

  Tilly sighed too, as if I’d asked her to walk barefoot to Aberdeen.

  ‘Why can’t you text her?’

  ‘I’m supposed to be at work!

  ‘I’m not dressed.’

  ‘Well, get bloody dressed, then. With all of us here, we can’t have one toilet not functioning. I can’t do everything–’

  ‘I’ll make coffee.’

  ‘Thank you!’

  The doorbell rang as she was pushing down the plunger on the cafetière. ‘That’ll be Jinni now. She said she wants full details.’ Tilly was getting a third cup from the shelf. ‘She can’t stand that bloke who drove you home. Says you shouldn’t trust him an inch.’

  ‘I’ve got to get this done–’

  ‘Are you seeing him again, then?’ Tilly demanded.

  I glanced at my phone, thinking about the text I’d got this morning. ‘It was a lift not a hot date. Open the door!’

  Jinni looked stricken. ‘Oh my God, Tess, I’m so sorry. I never thought they would do this to you!’

  I looked at her bewildered as she pointed outside. We went onto the front path and looked back at my house. Dark spray paint had been squirted in crazed squiggles all across the peeling white bricks. On the blank expanse between the two downstairs windows, someone had spelled out in wobbly writing: NO MORE DFLS. Above the door two caricature eyes had been drawn with staring eyeballs and cartoon eyelashes. I felt sick to my core.

  ‘He is such a fucking bastard!’ Jinni’s voice rose in fury and distress. ‘Going for me is one thing, but you too? What the fuck is he playing at?’

  ‘Who?’ Tilly was also looking horror-struck.

  I was shaking my head. ‘No really–’ But there was no stopping her. ‘This is all part of his horrible game. Look at the way he kissed you! That was all for my benefit. To show me he’d got you on side.’

  ‘Jinni, no. He was fine with me – really friendly. He’s sent me an invite this morning to a gallery opening. He–’

  ‘Believe me!’ Jinni said. ‘He knows we’re friends. That’s why he put the note through the door. I bet he couldn’t believe his luck when he got the chance to trap you in his car. He went on about the rectory, didn’t he, and why it’s so terrible what I’m–’

  ‘No, he didn’t,’ I interrupted her. ‘He agreed with me when I said I loved what you were doing and said he didn’t always agree with his mother.’

  ‘Hurrumph,’ Jinni gave a huge, disparaging snort. ‘He thinks he’s so clever. That was all an act for you. He’s trying to drive me out – waiting to buy it cheap when I give in. So he and his pervy mate can build a housing estate.’

  I looked at her uneasily. This really was paranoia. David had nothing to do with this, but my heart was still pounding. Who would do it?

  ‘Don’t you see?’ Jinni’s voice rose further. ‘It’s for me – it’s what I see when I look out of my window. Those eyes – they’re to say he’s watching me … He knows I’ve put in another objection …’

  My stomach was a solid ball of anxiety. ‘But he’s got another huge project on the go and he seemed very excited about that – I don’t think he cares about–’

  ‘Oh no?’ Jinni looked back at me stonily. ‘Come and see this, then.’ She swung on her heel and marched off. I followed her over the road, flinching in the cold wind that Jinni, dressed in a t-shirt and a torn pair of men’s overalls appeared not to notice. She strode over the gravel, to the right of her front door, and led me around the back of the rectory.

  ‘Look!’

  She waved an arm at the wooden lean-to on the back of her kitchen – a somewhat rickety-looking affair, filled with plant pots and bits of wood and an old rusting, barbecue. One window was broken, but what made me gasp was splashed over the remaining panes. Huge quantities of red gloss paint had been thrown all over the walls and glass and up onto the low roof. Sticky, congealed drips hung from the guttering like blood in a gruesome horror film and spread in pools at our feet. The empty can lay discarded on its side in the largest of them.

  ‘Christ,’ I said.

  Jinni folded her arms. ‘Too much of a coincidence?’

  I looked at her uncomfortably. ‘Do you really think–?

  ‘I really do.’ Jinni walked the few yards to her back door and stepped over some broken concrete to open it. ‘I suppose I’m going to have to keep this locked from now on.’

  I realised I was trembling. ‘I just can’t imagine him, in the dark and cold, wading through the snow and chucking paint all over the place.’ I insisted, picturing David’s immaculately creased trousers. ‘He said he was tired, he’d been up since 4 a.m.’

  Jinni gave a dismissive wave of her hand. ‘He wouldn’t do it himself, would he? He’d have paid some kids. There are some right little scrotes, who’d smash anything up for a fiver.’

  I hesitated, suddenly remembering that David had said something very similar – about the broken window being kids, about the ones who liked breaking things. But surely …

  ‘And you didn’t hear anything?’

  ‘Nope. The window was already broken. I knew nothing until I came down this morning.

  She gave a harsh laugh. ‘Irony is, I was going to pull it down anyway – all that’s going to be patio. It was in a shit state and not worth rebuilding. So I don’t give a flying fuck, actually, but what are they going to do next?’

  For the first time, she looked afraid, and I was too. It wasn’t David – I was certain of that – but who was it?

  I sat down opposite her at the big table. ‘What about that other woman, who had her tyres slashed? That wouldn’t be David.’

  Jinni ignored this. ‘Gabe’s on his way round, though what’s the point in that if the old git of an editor won’t run anything. I want them named and shamed.’

  ‘We must call the police.’

  ‘What can they do? I told them about the window and nothing happened. If there’s no witnesses …’ Jinni shrugged and then exploded. ‘Bloody hell – I can do without this. I’ve got that tree thing going on as well. The council stiff is coming tomorrow! Ah!’ She slapped her hand down hard on the wood. ‘That’s another reason he’s done it now – he probably knows when the appointment is and is showing me he does.’ She took another swig. ‘And I need to get it taken out so I can get the flagstones laid.’ She gave another bar
king laugh. ‘In the absence of getting laid myself!’

  The doorbell rang and she got up, still talking as she crossed her large hallway. ‘I was keeping my eye out for some talent last night in the pub, but it was all a bit thin of the ground.’

  I heard her open the front door. ‘Except for you, of course, my gorgeous boy. What a dark horse you turned out to be!’

  She came back into the room with Gabriel and an older, rather crumpled-looking bloke, with a camera slung round his neck. ‘Gabriel was the star of the evening,’ she declared to me. ‘Refused to sing but played like an angel.’

  ‘I can’t sing, that’s why.’ Gabriel crossed the room and hugged me. ‘Tess, I’ve just seen your house. Are you okay?’

  ‘We’ll get it repainted,’ said Jinni firmly. ‘Did you want to keep it white or–’

  ‘I had wondered about a deep grey–’ I still felt sick.

  ‘Classy!’ said Jinni approvingly. ‘We’ll jump in the car and get the gear as soon as they’re done here.’

  Gabriel turned to Jinni. ‘Do you want to show me the damage? Pete’s got another job to go to.’

  We all trooped back outside, where Pete attempted to position Jinni to the left of the most badly coated window.

  ‘If you can point at the paint and look upset–’ he directed.

  Jinni shook her head. ‘I’m not doing another one of those,’ she said briskly. ‘Just take the building.’

  Pete looked at Gabriel, askance. ‘He’ll want the human angle,’ he said flatly.

  ‘I’m not upset, anyway,’ added Jinni. ‘I’m bloody furious.’

  Gabriel scribbled something in his notebook.

  ‘Well, shake your fist, then,’ said Pete.

  ‘Balls,’ said Jinni rudely and walked back into the house.

  ‘Would you be prepared to be photographed in front of your house, Tess?’ Gabriel asked me hopefully.

  ‘No thank you,’ I told him.

  I went in after Jinni as Pete began snapping the paint stains with bad grace. Gabriel joined us a few minutes later. He listened patiently as Jinni launched into a long diatribe about Ingrid and David, including her theory that David was deliberately targeting me to gain inside information on her restoration plans so he could sabotage them.

  ‘But he didn’t actually ask anything,’ I put in. ‘I think he was just trying to pass the time till the train came.’

  Jinni shook her head at Gabriel. ‘She doesn’t know him like I do.’ She swung round towards me. ‘Why else is he asking to see you again?’

  ‘It might be a work thing,’ I said evenly, telling myself she’d had a shock and I should make allowances.

  Gabriel, generous as always, leapt in. ‘I’m sure lots of chaps would want to see Tess for a second time,’ he said gallantly.

  ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’ Jinni gave me a rueful smile. ‘Sorry.’ She turned back to Gabriel. ‘I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could spit.’

  The house was the quietest it had been for days. I laid sausages in a hot baking tin and broke eggs into a bowl, grateful for the low murmur of Radio Four instead of the constant blare of daytime TV.

  Oliver and Sam had gone back to London, and Tilly and Ben had been drafted into an impromptu working party by Jinni. Gabriel too had reappeared early afternoon saying he’d come to help me clean up – apparently with Malcolm’s blessing.

  We’d blotted out the worst of the graffiti with some new grey paint and I had been round one of the window frames in a deep navy blue, just to see if it would work. It would take a few more sessions, but I could see the end result would be stylish and at least those horrible eyes had been obliterated. I wanted to believe Jinni that they’d been pointed at her not me. She was quite volatile – perhaps David was right and she’d upset other people too …

  I was also trying to convince myself that the water level in the downstairs loo wasn’t higher than ever – Aaron, the plumber Jinni had suggested, had been on answerphone when I’d called – while knocking up a toad-in-the-hole for when they all returned. Jinni had last been seen issuing sledge hammers and instructing the workers to smash her outhouse to the ground while imagining it was ‘David’s fucking face’.

  She’d taken it for granted I was going to turn down his invitation, but I wanted to go, despite their silly feud. He’d introduce me to people who wanted interior design and might have work for me himself. Perhaps I should have told Jinni that in no uncertain terms, but I was afraid she’d explode all over again.

  I looked at the clock as I whisked up the batter. I needed to call my mother, text Nikki, who sounded at her wits’ end trying to sort home help for her own aged parents, and get back to Caroline to say yes I’d love to see her at the weekend. I smiled at the thought of her reaction when I told her I’d got a sort of date.

  My mother didn’t answer – I guessed she was probably glued to Eggheads, an evening ritual in which she frequently knew more answers than the contestants – so I left a message, bunged the tin in the oven, poured a glass of red and read the latest missive from my sister while I waited for The Archers.

  Right now, I thought, as the theme tune started, and – praise the heavens – nobody talked over it, being on my own felt soothing. Was that because I knew they were coming back?

  They came back filthy. Tilly, paint-spotted, with brick dust in her hair, disappeared upstairs ahead of Ben to shower, telling me Gabriel had gone home to clean up and Jinni would be over when she’d changed.

  ‘She was hitting it like a mad thing,’ Ben told me, leaning in the doorway equally grimy. ‘She’s bloody strong, Jinni. I wouldn’t fancy taking her on!’ He grinned. ‘She’s like that bouncer back at the Badger’s Hole.’

  ‘Hardly!’ I said, recalling the less-than-salubrious East Finchley pub and the squat, muscle-bound woman on the door, to whom Ben and his friends would never dare offer fake ID after one of them was unceremoniously lifted off his feet and put up against the wall.

  I looked him up and down. ‘Get your hands off the paintwork and put those jeans in the machine. They look like they could bring something down on their own!’

  The air was filled with the scent of shower gel – most of it mine – as we sat down at the table.

  Gabriel, in another sparkling white t-shirt beneath an open hoodie, opened the wine he’d brought with him. ‘I wanted to get you flowers,’ he said, as he came in, ‘but there was only the garage open and they looked a bit droopy.’

  ‘It’s very kind of you to keep feeding me,’ he added formally, as he poured.

  ‘Mum likes it,’ said Tilly. She picked up the dish of spinach and handed it to him. ‘And she makes masses because of Ben.’

  ‘My sister being such a delicate little eater,’ Ben said, nodding at Tilly’s heaped plate.

  ‘Demolition leaves you starving,’ Jinni was spooning potatoes onto her plate. ‘But very good for the biceps.’

  ‘I’ve got to get toned up again,’ said Tilly, flexing hers.

  ‘Again?’ Ben echoed with a grin.

  Tilly ignored him. ‘Is there a gym here?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said.

  ‘There’s a sort of fitness centre place off the High Street,’ said Jinni, but it’s not very big. Most people go into Bridgeford. They’ve got a big pool there too.’

  ‘I’ll check it out tomorrow when Ben’s gone.’

  ‘Haven’t you got to get back?’ I asked my daughter.

  She shrugged. ‘Can we get one of those swivel things you stand on? They’re only twenty quid and they tone up your waist really quickly if you go on it every day.’

  ‘Aren’t work expecting you?’

  ‘Sunday. In theory.’

  Before I could ask anything further, she’d turned to Gabriel and was asking about his plans for the weekend. I met Jinni’s eyes. She winked.

  ‘He’s good,’ she mouthed, adding more loudly: ‘They were all fantastic. Knocked seven shades out of that shit add-on. I must order a skip.’ />
  I watched my daughter and Gabriel chatting. How would she pay the rent if she didn’t go back to the diner? She’d been here nearly a week already; Sunday would make it ten days. She’d told me originally she was just taking the Easter weekend off …

  ‘Are you okay, Tess?’ Gabriel was smiling at me across the table. ‘You look worried. Try not to be. I’m sure–’

  ‘Oh no, I mean yes. I’m okay,’ I said. ‘Just thinking.’ I smiled back brightly. I had assured my offspring that whatever over-zealous protester – or bored teenager – had made their feelings clear on our paintwork it would be nothing personal and a one-off and I didn’t want to start any conversation that would make anyone else anxious again. Especially me. ‘Have some more gravy–’

  Gabriel insisted on helping me clear up and was still sitting at the small kitchen table telling me about the trials of working for Malcolm, and the endless rounds of council meetings and fund-raisers, when my two appeared poised for the pub.

  ‘I’ve just remembered,’ said Tilly. ‘Granny called this morning when you were over the road. She sounded a bit strange.’

  ‘How could you tell?’ Ben grinned.

  ‘Well, she was talking about you, for a start, about how you should go and play on the cruise ships because the bloke on her boat was out of tune and then she started going on about Mo and she said you were going to visit her, Mum, and she needed to know what time you’re arriving so she can get the beds ready.’

  I sighed. ‘No, she’s going to come and stay here.’

  Tilly shrugged. ‘Well, you’d better call her back, then. She thinks you and Ben are going next weekend.’

  ‘Are you coming?’ Gabriel asked me politely, repeating the question to Jinni, who was also putting her boots on.

  ‘Not for me,’ Jinni clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I’m going home to train a shotgun out of the window and then hit the sack. I want to carry on clearing that rubble in the morning.’

  ‘Don’t get yourself arrested,’ I said. ‘You know what the police said. You call them if you hear anything.’ She enveloped me in a hug. ‘Thanks for the nosh – it was great.’ She gave Ben a friendly punch. ‘And you look after yourself.’ She grinned at Tilly. ‘See you tomorrow, probably.’