Hubble Bubble

by Christina Jones

  Mitzi gazed at her reflection in the kitchen window. She looked every one of her fifty-five years and about a hundred of someone else’s. Last night’s make-up had creased into the crevasses, her eyes were baggy and dark shadowed with little globs of dried mascara clinging to her clumpy lashes like a pantomime dame’s, and her hair was matted and tufty. Her skin seemed to be hanging in folds, almost touching the collar of her not-quite-clean, ancient, towelling dressing gown, the one she used for slobbing in, not the elegant cream silk one she’d planned to throw so casually over her nakedness for Joel’s benefit.

  ‘Jesus …’

  Richard and Judy, emerging stretching from the washing basket in search of a second lunch, looked at her with unconditional love. She stroked them both, reassured by the twin-engined vibrato purrs.

  ‘At least someone loves me – oh, bugger!’ She looked up as the kitchen door started to open. ‘ Not Flo wanting coffee and gossip – not now. Oh, shit …’

  ‘Nice to see you too,’ Lance beamed at her. ‘Dear God, Mitzi. Are you ill? You look really awful. Sorry if it’s not a good time – didn’t you get my message? Left it on the answerphone last night.’

  Mitzi tried to shrink into a corner and glared at him. Of course she hadn’t got his damn message. She hadn’t looked at the damn phone. Last night she’d had other things on her mind, hadn’t she?

  ‘Go away, Lance. It’s not convenient.’

  ‘Then you should have answered my message. I said we’d be round at lunchtime to discuss a few things about Doll and Brett’s wedding.’

  We? We?

  ‘I’ve managed to park the car,’ Jennifer cooed, joining Lance in the doorway. ‘It’s such a funny narrow little road – oh, goodness Mitzi – have you got flu? You look dreadful!’

  Mitzi tried to cram herself back even further into the darkest corner. It simply wasn’t fair. Jennifer, dressed in pale suede, with a lilac cashmere scarf nestling round her throat, and long pale boots, exuded glossy radiance and elegant good-grooming from head to toe.

  ‘She didn’t get our message,’ Lance said cheerfully, ushering Jennifer into the kitchen. ‘Oh, nothing changes, does it? It’s still a mess in here.’

  Jennifer, staring at the clutter, gingerly pulled out a chair and inspected it for grime before sitting down. Richard and Judy immediately went into a synchro, arched-back, bushed-tail routine and hissed at her as they backed away through the remains of the cup-a-soups and crusts.

  ‘I said it wasn’t convenient,’ Mitzi croaked, peeling herself away from the wall and staring venomously at Lance and Jennifer. ‘As you can see, I’m hardly ready for visitors and anyway—’

  ‘Ooh, we’re not stopping for long.’ Jennifer’s immaculately manicured pearly nails gathered crumbs together on the table top. ‘We’re off to London for a few days. We’re staying at the Savoy and Lance is treating me to a shopping trip to Bond Street. As a birthday treat.’

  Mitzi said nothing. Lance used to bring her service-station bouquets and a couple of drinks at The Faery Glen – when he remembered her birthday.

  ‘I suggested we popped in,’ Lance said, ‘as Jennifer is going to buy her wedding outfit – designer, of course – and she didn’t want to clash with yours.’

  ‘How very thoughtful.’

  ‘So,’ Jennifer turned her perfect peachy face towards Mitzi. ‘What colour are you wearing?’

  ‘ Green.’

  ‘Green! Green? You can’t wear green! It’s sooo unlucky!’

  ‘Only if you’re the bride, apparently.’ Mitzi tried to rearrange her hair and de-clog her eyelashes. ‘And I like green.’

  ‘Dear me,’ Jennifer said, a smile tugging at the corners of her plump lips. ‘How very retro. No problems about clashing there, then. And what about hats? Have you had one made?’

  ‘I’m not wearing a hat. No one’s wearing a hat. It’s not that sort of wedding. It’s only very small and informal.’

  ‘You can’t go to a wedding without a hat!’ Jennifer looked as though Mitzi had suggested the entire congregation should go naked. ‘I’m going to Philip Treacey for mine.’

  ‘Excellent choice.’ The kitchen door opened again and like a really, really bad dream, Tarnia appeared. ‘Mine are all from darling Jasper of course, but Philip is a poppet as well.’

  ‘What the hell do you want?’ Mitzi growled as Tarnia and Jennifer exchanged mwah-mwah kisses across the strewn table. ‘You haven’t been to see me since 1985!’

  Tarnia, also looking perfectly groomed and glowing in baby pink leather trousers and a black biker jacket and boots, with her short black hair artlessly tipped in pink frosting, narrowed her eyes. ‘Heavens, Mitzi. I hadn’t realised you were ill. It’s put years on you.’

  ‘I’m not ill. I’m fine. I’m just not dressed for holding an open house.’

  ‘At midday?’ Lance laughed. ‘You’re really letting yourself go. No, okay, we’ll leave you to sort yourself out. It’ll probably take the rest of the day … Anyway, we don’t want to be late for dinner at the Savoy. And at least Jennifer will have a free hand in Bond Street now – no one else will be wearing green.’

  ‘Green?’ Tarnia shrieked. ‘You can’t wear green to the wedding, Mitzi! It’s unlucky.’

  ‘Only if you’re the bride, apparently.’ Jennifer got to her feet, inspecting the pale suede for crumbs and cats’ fur. There were loads of both on her bottom but she couldn’t see them. ‘When we’re back from London, Tarnia, I’ll ring you about the Bancroft-Hulmes’s drinks party, shall I?’

  Tarnia nodded, and after another round of mwah-mwahs, Lance and Jennifer escaped.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Tarnia said. ‘I know this is probably a bit unexpected, but I was dropping some stuff off at the charity shop and thought as I was so close, I should just call in and ask if you’ve got any more of those little menu list things. You know, for your ancient country cooking foodie stuff. Marquis and I are planning a huge supper party for the charity commissioners in the New Year and, well, everyone is bored to tears with Nigella and Jamie, so I wanted to be the first to do something different.’

  ‘They’re around somewhere …’ Mitzi looked helplessly at the piles of clutter on every surface. ‘I’ll look for them later and drop them off to you.’

  ‘That’s okay. You look as though you should go back to bed. And have you thought of surgery, Mitzi? Or at least a chemical peel and a detox? We owe it to ourselves to keep young and beautiful as the song goes. And—’ Tarnia pulled as much of a knowing face as the Botox would allow ‘—you’ll never hang on to that absolutely divinely sexy young dentist if he sees you looking like the village crone.’

  Feeling as though someone had just punched the air from her lungs, Mitzi tried hard not to crumple. ‘No … probably not.’

  ‘Tell you what,’ Tarnia sang out, heading for the door, ‘don’t worry too much about your menu thingies. The ladies in the charity shop told me there’s a bit of a Christmas show on at the village hall next week. No doubt you’re involved – can’t imagine why you didn’t tell me about it – and Marquis and I will have to be seen to be there. So we’ll pick them up from you then. Byeeeee …’

  Chapter Twenty-three

  DREAMING CREAMS

  Two cups of icing sugar

  One cup of the finest flour

  Half a dozen eggs

  Half a pint of fresh double cream

  Handful of ground walnut

  The rind and zest and juice of two lemons

  A sprinkling of ground ginger

  A handful of beggar’s buttons

  Crushed china berry

  A pinch of allspice

  Beat flour, sugar, eggs and cream together. Leave in a cool place.

  Mix together lemons, ginger, beggar’s buttons, china berry, and allspice. Grind small with pestle and mortar.

  Whisk into cold creamed mixture.

  Spoon into buttered patty tins.

  Bake for three quarters of one hour in a modera
te oven. The outside of the Dreaming Creams should be crisp and crumbly, while the insides should be of a soft and chewy consistency.

  Note: Making dreams come true is easy with the right herbal magic. This combination is particularly efficacious. Dreaming Creams are made from a powerful country recipe which has been successful for generations. Whether spoken aloud or thought silently, dreams WILL come true if made while eating Dreaming Creams. These sweetmeats are traditionally used for wedding feasts.

  ‘Maybe we should try and make some sort of love potion for your mum,’ Brett said as he and Doll queued under lowering skies outside the village hall the following Saturday afternoon. ‘From her recipe book. After all it’s supposed to have worked for us – and for Lu and Shay, isn’t it?’

  Doll shoved him none too gently in the ribs and stamped her numbing feet. ‘That’s all rubbish and you know it is. Sadly, whatever went wrong between Mum and Joel is too far gone for a few herbs to make any difference.’

  ‘But Lulu says she made some sort of wishing star meringues to finally hook Shay.’

  ‘Yeah, right. Lu also says she can’t understand why Mum and Joel have split up because they shared some really powerful apple love magic at Halloween and it can’t have gone wrong. It’s all hokum. As I’ve said all along.’ She gazed up at the heavy sky. ‘Do you think it’s going to snow?’

  Brett shook his head. ‘Not according to the forecasts, no.’

  It was only ten days before the wedding. The wind was screaming down from the Arctic, ripping at the flapping corners of the Hair posters outside the hall. The weather was getting colder and greyer by the minute, but the chances of a white Christmas were still officially about a million to one. Doll, who secretly relished the idea of walking from Lance’s car to the church in a snowstorm, was very disappointed.

  She was also more concerned about Mitzi than she was prepared to admit. Joel, she felt, could lick his own wounds in the sort of secretive macho way men always did. Sure, he wasn’t usually afraid of being in touch with his feminine side, but this time confession sessions were clearly a no-go area. He’d simply refused to talk about Mitzi and Doll had given up trying to make him.

  Mitzi, although professing to be fine, was anything but. She seemed to have shrunk back into herself, even more so than when Lance had first decamped with Jennifer. As she’d made such huge life strides recently, since leaving the bank, Doll found this rapid sliding backwards more than a little worrying. Doll knew her mother was desperately unhappy, but she too refused to discuss the break-up. Even Lu, obsessed as she was with Shay, the forthcoming career move, and Pip, Squeak and Wilfred, had noticed.

  ‘Bloody long wait,’ Clyde Spraggs muttered ahead of them in the queue. ‘Like being in the West End.’

  ‘You’ve never been to the West End,’ Flo said tartly. ‘And what’s in that bottle?’

  ‘Dandelion and rosehip with a touch of moonshine. Keeps out the cold.’

  ‘Give it here then – no, don’t let young Doll have any. She’s carrying, remember?’

  ‘Why aren’t the bloody doors open?’ Someone else complained at the head of the queue. ‘We’ve been waiting hours and it’s bloody freezing.’

  The cry was picked up along the snaking queue. Any minute now, Doll thought, there’d be a Hazy Hassocks riot.

  ‘Why are we waiting? Oh, w-h-y are we waiting?’ someone chorused behind them. ‘Why are we wa-i-t-ing? Why-oh-why?’

  The discordant but mainly jocular vocal complaint was echoed over and over again as villagers from Hazy Hassocks, Bagley-cum-Russett and Fiddlesticks all joined in.

  It was, Doll thought, probably far more tuneful than anything else they’d hear that afternoon.

  ‘Are we going to be late?’ Lu puffed as she and Shay, entwined as always, hurried across the village green. ‘Doesn’t Hair kick off at three?’

  ‘No we’re not and yes it does,’ Shay said, his head down against the wind. ‘It’s only half-two and we’ll be there in a couple of minutes – but I knew we should have brought the car. It’s bloody freezing. I suppose this is where the Afghan comes into its own?’

  Lulu nodded. It was. To be honest, the Afghan had always caused her a bit of a dilemma. Should someone as dedicated to animal welfare as she was really spend her life wearing the skins of dead, albeit long-dead, goats? As she’d always been very careful about not eating anything with a face or wearing anything other than man-made shoes, it sometimes bothered her. She’d always justified it to herself by saying the wearing of the Afghan was a living memorial to the animals which had given their lives for the vanity of man, and hoped that they’d forgive her.

  The wind punched across the green in icy waves, and not for the first time Lu was delighted to be shrouded in the Afghan’s impenetrable layers. She’d persuaded Shay to walk to the village hall because she was keen to map out the best routes for Pip, Squeak and Wilfred’s future constitutionals. Neither of them had expected it to be quite so cold.

  ‘Oh, look – Honeysuckle House is on the market.’

  Shay looked across the green. ‘It’s not a house and there isn’t any honeysuckle.’

  ‘Pedant.’

  ‘Looks nice though. A real cottage. Very tiny – probably only two up and two down? And the sign says it’s to let, not for sale. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could—’

  ‘Yeah. Perfect.’ Lu sighed. ‘And the garden would be great for the puppies – not to mention being right on the village green for walks and stuff. The rent is probably affordable too, because it belongs to the vicar and he usually lets it out to deserving cases – which we are. Amy and Frank Worthy had it last – before the trouble. I didn’t know they’d finally gone.’

  ‘What trouble?’

  ‘You don’t really want to know about the trouble, do you? Yeah, you obviously do. Well, Amy and Frank looked like Mr and Mrs Middle-England. Retired. Rotary. Daily Mail and Telegraph readers. Pillars of the church. Genteel and impoverished. Just right for the vicar’s good Honeysuckle House cause. Sadly, they spent all their spare time making videos for the discerning gentleman.’

  ‘They made porn films?’ Shay laughed. ‘In that dear little cottage?’

  ‘No, not in there. Somewhere near Epping Forest – they lived a perfectly respectable life in Honeysuckle House. But of course when it came to court and the News of the World, the vicar had to give them notice to quit.’

  ‘Oh, of course,’ Shay laughed again. ‘This place is amazing. And why is the vicar a man of property? I thought they were supposed to give up all worldly goods when they took the cloth. Does he own a lot of property?’

  ‘Just Honeysuckle House and his Harley-Davidson. He says they’re his pension fund. Oh, but wouldn’t it be brilliant if we could live there?’

  They looked at one another and sighed. It would be perfect. But they couldn’t even contemplate it because of Lav and Lob.

  ‘Forget it,’ Lulu said. ‘I know it’s out of the question. Anyway, we’ve got other things to worry about.’

  ‘Your mum, you mean?’

  ‘Mmmm. She’s so unhappy. I hate seeing her like this. I can’t imagine what went wrong. That apple magic is supposed to be infallible.’

  ‘Sweetheart, maybe it was infallible in your Great-Gran’s time, but not now.’

  ‘Don’t be daft. Magic is timeless.’

  ‘Whatever. But even so, they looked really happy that night in Lorenzo’s – it must have been something major to have changed things so drastically. Is she still not talking about it?’

  ‘Neither of them are,’ Lu said miserably as they slithered off the green and headed for the village hall. ‘Me and Doll hoped they’d get together again at the wedding and at least talk to one another but Joel says he’s not going now. Blimey! Look at that queue! Oh, great – Doll and Brett are near the front. Let’s push in with them.’

  Inside the hall, nerves were getting the better of the Hair cast. Trilby Man was racing around backstage, barking last-minute instructions, fright
ening the life out of everyone and getting in the way. Mitzi, who had peered out of the window at the immense queue, felt nothing at all.

  It was very disconcerting, this ongoing feeling of total apathy.

  ‘Right!’ Trilby Man snapped behind her. ‘Let’s get those doors open. Are you sure you’re okay for front of house, duck? You looks as rough as a badger’s arse.’

  ‘Thanks so much. And I’m fine.’

  ‘And the half-time refreshments? Can you handle them, too?’

  Mitzi nodded. They’d had a sort of co-operative arrangement over the refreshments with everyone in the Baby Boomers bringing something. Sadly, because no one bothered to write it down, they now had far too many sausage rolls and not enough cake. Lavender and Lobelia had provided sardine and mustard sandwiches. Mitzi had halfheartedly made some bits and pieces from Granny’s recipe book. Nothing too controversial, of course, just some of her tried and tested recipes.

  She hurried between the rows and rows of empty chairs, and flicked on the auditorium lights. The pain under her ribs was ever present, and her head felt as if it was filled with cotton wool. She missed Joel so much. They’d so looked forward to this afternoon, too. Joel wouldn’t be here now, naturally. Or at the wedding. He’d already told Doll he’d decided to go back to his parents in Manchester for Christmas.

  Pulling open the hall’s double doors, Mitzi was almost knocked sideways by the twin onslaught of a northerly gale and several hundred cold people. Her request for tickets was lost in the raucous mêlée.

  As they all streamed in, it was like her life in Hazy Hassocks flashing before her eyes. Everyone was there. Well, everyone except Lance and Jennifer because, on their return from London, they’d booked themselves a relaxing-and-tanning health farm break so that they’d look like the village’s answer to Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones at the wedding.