Sunshine Over Wildflower Cottage

by Milly Johnson

‘Oh, Linda, has Freddie been round to see you?’

  Linda raised her hand and waved it in a gesture of ‘don’t talk about it’.

  ‘Has he heck,’ said Iris. ‘I put that there because Rebecca said she’d bring him round yesterday for half an hour and guess what, she didn’t turn up. Again.’

  Caro didn’t have grandchildren herself, but she could still imagine what it would be like to not be allowed to see them because your ex-daughter-in-law was a controlling cow. She snatched at the nearest passing subject to divert Linda’s thoughts.

  ‘We should get some tickets and go to the theatre, make an evening of it. We haven’t been for ages, have we?’

  ‘Well, I’m not going this week,’ said Linda. ‘They’re putting on Rebecca. No wonder Laurence Olivier drowned her.’

  The Old Spice Girls had gravitated to one another to form a friendship group over the years, as women do. Linda was a nurse and had met Stel at St Theresa’s Hospice, where the latter still worked as head receptionist. Iris lived with Linda, and they and Gaynor lived on the same sprawling estate in Dodley. Stel and Caro first met when their children had been in hospital at the same time ten years ago and they’d bonded in the hospital coffee shop as they waited for good news.

  ‘Did Viv get off all right, then?’ asked Iris.

  Stel didn’t answer, because her throat felt suddenly blocked with a ball of solidified tears.

  ‘She’ll be all right, love,’ said Linda. ‘She’s a sensible lass, is Viv.’

  ‘She went off to university for three years, Stel. Surely that acclimatised you for her leaving home?’ said Gaynor.

  ‘That was different, Gaynor. She was home nearly every weekend and in the holidays. I always felt as if she were on a piece of elastic, but now . . .’ Her voice dissolved into a croak.

  ‘She’s only gone to the moors, not emigrated to bloody New Zealand,’ said Gaynor impatiently as she got up from the sofa. ‘Think about me. I haven’t seen my Leanne for nearly six months.’

  Lucky you, thought most of the room. Leanne Pollock had been one of those horrible, spoiled kids who had grown up into an even more horrible, spoiled young woman. She took the art of self-serving to new levels. She had done Gaynor a favour by moving down to London to pursue a modelling career; not that any of them would say that to her, with the possible exception of Iris if the opportunity presented itself.

  Gaynor snapped her fingers. ‘I knew there was something I had to tell you all. Leanne had an audition for that top modelling agency a couple of weeks ago. You know, the one that Kate Moss used to work for. And they would have taken her, they said, but for one thing, one tiny thing . . .’ She pincered her thumb and finger together. ‘And do you know what it was?’

  ‘Her face?’ suggested Iris.

  ‘No, her height.’ Gaynor glared at the chippy octogenarian. ‘She was one inch too short. Would you have thought an inch made that much difference?’

  Caro snorted down her nose and Gaynor threw her a dirty look.

  ‘An inch can make a hell of a difference, Gaynor love,’ Linda winked at her.

  ‘Oh, I’m going to the loo if you’re going to talk smut,’ said Gaynor. The air seemed to lighten by several degrees when she left the room, shutting the door hard behind her. Once upon a time, thought Caro, Gaynor would have been the first to chuckle at the innuendo.

  ‘Your father and I were always very active in the bedroom,’ put in Iris, causing Linda to cover her ears.

  ‘Mum, please.’

  Iris huffed in exasperation. ‘That’s the trouble, every generation thinks it invented sex. I used to be a young woman with a figure that your father had difficulty keeping his hands off. We once managed—’

  ‘La la la la.’ Linda couldn’t hear what her mother and father had managed to do because she was singing and her hands were over her ears. But her friends did – if their widened eyeballs were anything to go by.

  ‘I reckon Gaynor needs a good bonk,’ whispered Stel. ‘Hasn’t Eamonn got any nice friends, Caro?’

  ‘They wouldn’t get up there for the barbed wire,’ sniffed Iris.

  Linda immediately rounded on her. ‘Mum, that is mean. Gaynor’s struggling and anger is her way of dealing with it. Even if it wouldn’t be yours or my way of doing things.’

  All of them wished for her sake that Gaynor could move on, and they knew she wouldn’t do that until she stopped denying her Mick the divorce he wanted. She was being as awkward as she knew how, not responding to his solicitor’s letters and making her presence felt in any way she could as punishment for leaving her for a girl over thirty years younger than she was. And a Bellfield at that. There were some rough renowned families in the town: the O’Gowans, the Clamps, the Crookes; but the Bellfields were considered the worst. Young Danira Bellfield (or de Niro as Gaynor so scathingly called her) was as different from Gaynor as she could be, which wasn’t very flattering to Gaynor, and gave a gigantic clue to why Mick had left his wife two weeks after their Pearl Wedding Anniversary. Danira was plump and loud, peroxide-blonde and wanton. But Gaynor, for all her Hyacinth Bouquet pretensions, was a good woman who’d worked hard to make a comfortable home for her family, only to be rewarded with a duplicitous husband and a self-obsessed daughter.

  There was the sound of a flush in the background, so Linda quickly switched the subject to the neighbours.

  ‘Annie and Joe next door are renewing their marriage vows in Jamaica next month.’

  ‘I bet he was doing the dirty on her,’ sniffed Gaynor as she walked back in and immediately joined in the conversation. ‘Couples who renew their vows usually have that story to tell.’

  ‘Actually, you’re wrong because—’ began Linda, but Gaynor cut her off.

  ‘You mark my words, they won’t just be doing it because they’re still so much in lurrrve.’ Gaynor loaded the word with all the sarcasm it could carry. ‘It’ll come out eventually. He’ll have been dipping his wick where he shouldn’t have been. He was always too good-looking for her,’ she huffed derisively.

  That couldn’t be said of her own marriage. Mick Pollock was a smart, handsome man but Gaynor more than matched him for looks. She had the same dark colouring, wide mouth and big brown eyes as Sophia Loren. In fact that was the first line Mick had ever said to her: Excuse me, could I have your autograph, Miss Loren? Corny, but it worked on her. She had always taken care over her appearance, maybe too much so. Maybe she had been too polished for Mick’s tastes, if the slobby Danira was anything to go by. The past year was telling on Gaynor though. Her mouth was set in a downward arc and she radiated waves of resentment. If she had been born a cobra, her hood would have been permanently expanded.

  ‘A fucking Bellfield!’ exclaimed Gaynor, sliding into dark, slimy waters in her head. ‘Lowest of the low. And what does she see in him? He’s thirty years older than her for a start. When we got married, she wasn’t even born.’ She shuddered as if that somehow made him a paedophile. ‘It won’t be anything to do with his bank balance, will it? Anyway, he can whistle for his divorce. I burned the last set of papers in our firepit and I’ll do the same with the next lot. Bastard. I’ll make it as hard as possible for him to get me out of his life.’

  The room crackled with Gaynor’s electric bitterness. The only sound was Iris’s cup hitting the saucer. Then Caro’s soft, smoky voice broke through the silence.

  ‘Do you think maybe, for your own sake, you should let him go, Gaynor love?’

  Gaynor’s lips narrowed until they were almost invisible.

  ‘You are joking?’

  Caro prepared to back up her words with more of the same. ‘No, I’m not. Look around you, Gaynor. You’re in a room full of people who care for you. You’re young enough to start a new life, find a new man. All this fighting is damaging you more than it is him.’

  ‘It needed saying,’ added Iris, who was never one to miss the opportunity to throw petrol on a fire. ‘It’s what everyone here is thinking.’

  ‘Is it now?’
Gaynor’s eyes took them all in.

  ‘Because we’re your friends and we love you, Gaynor,’ Caro said. She was all too aware that Gaynor thought that she had the Midas touch, and so what would she really know about what Gaynor was going through. Caro had a gorgeous faithful husband, loving children, a big house, a successful business and his-and-hers Mercedes and a motorhome parked in the treble garage. Caro shopped in Waitrose, wore expensive clothes, and had a diamond the size of Poland on her third finger. She and Gaynor had been close friends until Mick had buggered off. His leaving had triggered an irrational envy of Caro which Gaynor knew was both wrong and puerile, but she just couldn’t help it. Right now, getting a life lecture from Caro was like pouring acid in Gaynor’s wounds.

  Gaynor stood up.

  ‘Well, if you’ve all decided behind my back that I’m a bore and you’re all on flaming de Niro’s side, I’ll go.’

  ‘Gaynor, don’t be daft.’

  ‘Oh don’t, Gaynor.’

  Protests ensued but Gaynor wouldn’t be placated.

  ‘I’ll show myself out.’ She strode out on her long, pin-thin legs and the others knew they had no choice but to let her go when she was in that stubborn mood of hers. They exchanged cringes and shrugged.

  ‘No wonder she’s on her own,’ piped up Iris.

  ‘Mum,’ objected Linda.

  ‘We-ell,’ said Iris, waving away her daughter’s indignation. ‘It might do her good to know that everyone thinks she’s in the wrong. You’ve to be cruel to be kind sometimes. She’s in a rut and she wants booting out of it.’

  ‘Iris is right,’ replied Caro. She hated that there was distance between them and wished they could get back onto a normal footing. The trouble was that the more rain that fell on Gaynor recently, the more the heavens seemed to shine on Caro. If Caro could have stemmed the tide of her good fortune and diverted it to Gaynor, she wouldn’t have hesitated to give her friend a break.

  ‘She’ll come round,’ said Stel, watching Gaynor strut down the road through the window. ‘Let her stew for a bit. She knows we are on her side.’

  ‘I worry that Mick will start playing funny beggars,’ said Linda. ‘Guilt’s made him offer a generous divorce settlement, but if she keeps on refusing to cooperate he might start getting as bolshie as she is. I’d hate for her to lose out financially.’

  Linda hadn’t known Mick that well but she’d been surprised when he’d left Gaynor. He’d seemed such a quiet man, easy-going and settled, even a bit boring. Gaynor had idolised him; and despite her believing that she and Mick had been together for so long that she knew him inside out, she had been the last to discover that he’d been messing around behind her back. The split had hit her hard, but she hadn’t yet worked her way through the natural grieving process that might have healed her. Instead she had stuck fast on the ‘anger’ setting. Gaynor wanted Mick back, and as far as she could see it, clinging on until she had worn down his resistance was her only option.

  Linda suddenly leaped to her feet and headed for the bar area in the corner, returning with a bottle of Prosecco and some glasses.

  ‘Bugger tea, let’s have a glass and wish Viv well. I didn’t know she was that fond of animals, Stel, that she’d want to up and go work in an animal sanctuary.’

  ‘She’s based in their office, not actually hands-on with the animals,’ explained Stel. ‘She wanted a bit of experience working with people in a small business doing accounts and suchlike.’

  Linda handed round the Prosecco and poured her mother a Tia Maria, as she didn’t drink wine of any description. Iris insisted that all wine tasted of feet, and firmly believed every grape had been trodden by some bloke with verrucas.

  ‘To Viv. Here’s hoping she enjoys her new home and her new job.’

  ‘To Viv.’

  Four glasses were raised in the air. And Stel Blackbird smiled, though inside her heart was breaking because she suspected the real reason why her daughter had taken up that post had nothing to do with getting experience of a small business at all.

  Chapter 3

  Viv followed Geraldine back into the homely kitchen where the small owl bobbed and squawked at them as if to say ‘where’ve you been?’ The kettle was whistling cheerfully on the Aga. Geraldine put some teabags into an old brown teapot and whirled them around with a spoon.

  ‘Is it just the two of you that work here then?’ asked Viv.

  ‘Just the two of us full-time now,’ echoed Geraldine. ‘Though Armstrong likes to come and help out. We pay him in eggs and a bit of pocket money. You’ll have guessed we don’t have a lot of money for wages.’

  Viv had.

  Geraldine poured out the tea and put a plate of buttered cake slices on the table. ‘Made by my own fair hand. Date and walnut,’ she smiled. ‘And fresh butter from the farm up the road.’

  Viv was touched that a cake had been baked in her honour. Her mother did things like that – made cakes for every occasion, though her efforts wouldn’t have exactly had Mary Berry throwing in her towel for fear of the opposition.

  ‘It’s not a very big sanctuary, is it?’ said Viv.

  ‘You noticed,’ said Geraldine. ‘Look, I hope you don’t mind me saying this . . . I don’t want to scare you off but . . . I just want to warn you.’

  Viv froze mid-chew. Warn her? About what?

  ‘You’re very young . . .’ Geraldine sighed.

  ‘I’m twenty-three,’ answered Viv quickly. She considered herself more woman than child, but then she had thought that for several years now. She’d had to grow up fast in her teens.

  ‘Oh, bless you,’ replied Geraldine. Her eyes were blinking as if there was a lot of activity going on in the brain behind them. Then, as if a dam had broken inside her, she opened her mouth and said, before she could stop herself, ‘Look, I’ll come straight out with it. Heath isn’t the easiest man to get on with, especially at the moment. There’s a lot of tension. We’re struggling financially and . . . well . . . he can be difficult, blunt, but underneath he’s wonderful, lovely, kind.’ Then she fell abruptly silent and, as if she had sustained a puncture, her whole body seemed to sag. ‘I might as well be honest, Viv, we need someone here, someone who will stay and adjust to him and let him adjust to them without immediately running off.’

  ‘Ok-ay,’ replied Viv, wondering what could be so alarming about this Heath bloke. He wouldn’t scare her away. She needed to be here, and so she would put up with him, no matter what.

  ‘Don’t judge him on first appearances is all I ask.’

  ‘I’m sure everything will be fine.’ Viv sipped at her tea, which was strong, just as she liked it. Strong as her resolve not to be intimidated by some old curmudgeon who enjoyed pushing his weight around.

  ‘Once you get to know him, you’ll find his bark is much worse than his bite,’ smiled Geraldine, relieved by Viv’s attitude. ‘Now, bring your tea with you and let me show you where you’ll be staying so you can get settled in. I hope you’ll be all right in the folly. It’s compact, but very pretty and you can shut the door on us at the weekends.’

  ‘Do you live on-site too?’ asked Viv.

  ‘Yes, my room’s at the back of the house, through there,’ said Geraldine, pointing to a door in the corner of the kitchen. She sniffed the air. ‘I must say, your luggage smells lovely.’

  ‘One of my suitcases is full of oils,’ replied Viv, picking up the heaviest one. ‘I blend them for companies.’

  ‘Blend oils?’ Geraldine questioned.

  ‘I have a neurological quirk,’ Viv told her, going on to explain in more detail. ‘An acute sense of smell.’

  Geraldine was looking at her the way most people did when she said as much.

  ‘The best way I can explain it to you is . . . you’ll have seen the picture of white light hitting a prism and dividing into a rainbow?’

  ‘Yes,’ replied Geraldine.

  ‘That’s how I perceive scents. It’s like I’m the prism and when I smell something, each component
separates itself from the others in my brain. And I also construct formulas; for instance, if a company want me to recreate the essence of an old library or an autumn walk.’

  ‘That’s amazing,’ gasped Geraldine.

  ‘I know it’s weird,’ returned Viv, ‘but I don’t mind it.’

  The school bullies used to have a go at her about being a freak, but she refused to feed them with her fear. Ignore them. They’re just jealous, because they’re ordinary, her mother had said. Stel had always been as brilliant at giving advice as she had been as rubbish at taking it.

  ‘Sometimes the things that make you weird turn out to be your greatest assets, did you know that?’ said Geraldine, wheeling the smaller of the two cases towards the door.

  Viv smiled. That was such a Stel philosophy it was as if she had just flitted in to join them.

  ‘So who buys these formulas then? People who make candles and those reed diffuser things?’ Geraldine went on.

  ‘Amongst others, yes.’

  ‘Goodness. I didn’t know such a job existed.’

  ‘I’m not sure it does either,’ chuckled Viv, following her out of the door. ‘I didn’t think anyone would take me seriously when I started, but they did.’

  ‘So it makes you some pin money, does it? It’s good that you can supplement your wages, then. It’s embarrassing what we offer here.’

  Viv didn’t say that it made her more money than Geraldine could guess at.

  They headed past Viv’s car, across the yard to the tall, castle-like folly. Geraldine unlocked it with a long key befitting the heavy arched door, which opened with a characterful creak into a sitting room with rough stone walls and a rich dark wooden floor. There was a two-seater high-backed green sofa and a footstool and a table and two dining chairs. Alongside one wall, there was a run of dark wooden kitchen units, a brown electric oven and hob, a sink and a narrow white half-fridge. Above the sink was a yellow stained-glass window, throwing a golden light onto a welcome-basket of eggs, butter, bread and milk on the draining board. Pretty green curtains hung at the side of a large arched window affording a view of Ironmist hillside and a stone seat was set in the deep wall beneath it. It was certainly ‘compact’ but on the right side of cosy, rather than cramped.