Coming Home To Holly Close Farm

by Julie Houston

  Mum brightened. ‘You could take him over to Almost Heaven and see Madge and cheer up all the other old biddies. Apparently stroking dogs will make them live longer.’

  ‘What? The dogs?’

  ‘No, the old biddies,’ Mum said vaguely. ‘You wouldn’t like to make some mince pies, Charlie, would you?’

  I wouldn’t.

  ‘Do the old biddies want to live longer in that place? And no, I don’t want to make mince pies.’

  ‘Neither do I.’ Mum frowned. ‘Now you’re nearly thirty, Charlie, you really need to take on a bit of responsibility. You know, whip up a batch of mince pies like other thirty-year-olds.’

  ‘Shall I go on to the Co-op and get a couple of packets and take their lids off? I could stick some glacé cherries and some of Dad’s whisky in them, like you usually do.’

  Mum looked shifty. ‘I didn’t know you knew I did that.’

  ‘Mum, we’ve always known you do that.’ I gave her a friendly dig in the ribs as she dragged a net of sprouts towards her in an attempt to ‘get ahead’ as commanded by Delia.

  ‘What the hell does she mean by this?’ Mum pulled her spectacles from her head and squinted at Delia Smith’s Christmas, opened up on the granite. ‘Oh, haven’t got a clue: I blame your granny Nancy – she never taught me to cook.’ She frowned. ‘But, I suppose knowing what we now know, I can’t blame all my shortcomings on my mother. I mean, the poor thing, she was only nine when her father was hanged. How would she have coped at school? You know how mean kids can be… I mean, hanged…?’

  ‘Could you stop saying that word?’ I pulled a face.

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Hanged.’ Every time it was aired I could actually feel the coarse rope around my own neck. I shuddered. ‘So, is Granny Nancy coming tomorrow? Have you heard from her?’

  ‘She rang me the other day. Terrible line, but I got the impression she’s going to be here. In the country, at least. Apparently, she has a new friend.’

  ‘Another one?’

  ‘You know Granny Nancy. She’ll just put in an appearance when she’s good and ready. She really doesn’t keep in touch with Madge like she should. Maybe it’s because of the hanging?’ Mum glanced up from doing something unspeakable with the poor turkey’s innards.

  ‘Mum! Not the H word.’ I shuddered again, doubly so as I looked at what she had in her hands.

  ‘I can’t say “giblets”.’ Mum whispered the word as if it were gynaecological, and shuddered in turn. She turned back to Delia and then started counting peppercorns from a bottle that had a use-by date of 2003. ‘Why nine peppercorns, for heaven’s sake? Why not thirteen or eighteen or nineteen and a half? Oh, feck it.’ She opened the bin and threw the glistening brown mess towards it. ‘I’ll make the gravy from Bisto.’

  ‘Granny Nancy’s still got her apartment in Harrogate, hasn’t she?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes. She wouldn’t live in a backwater like Midhope ever again. Not enough expensive dress shops for her to spend her days in. I drive over to see her when she’s in the country, but she rarely comes over here, apart from Christmas and when she feels guilty enough to visit Madge.’ Mum paused and glanced my way. ‘I thought that rather attractive boy from school had invited you to something this evening?’ She finished wrapping the turkey in its sheets of tinfoil and went to fill the kettle.

  ‘Yes, he’s having a Christmas Eve party.’

  ‘So, why aren’t you going? I’d be off like a shot.’ Mum peered at me through her specs and then, realising they were her reading glasses, tutted and shoved them back on to her head.

  ‘Well, yes, I was actually quite looking forward to it, but it’s fancy dress. I hate bloody fancy dress. Daisy saw him in Clementine’s the other night and he told her to remind me to come dressed up.’

  ‘Clementine’s?’ Mum looked put out. ‘Who was he in there with? He’s not two-timing you, is he?’

  I have to say, when Daisy had told me about it being fancy dress at one in the morning, coming into my bedroom in the bungalow, switching on my bedroom light and waking me, I’d thrown a pillow at her and told her to tell me in the morning.

  ‘I’m not exactly going out with Josh, Mum.’

  ‘Oh?’ She seemed surprised, and then shrugged. ‘So, just having sex with him, then? Well, you do right.’

  I stared at Mum as she hacked away at the bag of sprouts, discarding most of them in an ever-increasing mountain of green leaves. ‘You’ve changed your tune,’ I muttered, embarrassed. ‘You’ve spent the last fifteen years telling me to keep my hand on my halfpenny, and myself for the man I married.’

  ‘A mother has to say that to her teenaged daughters,’ Mum said comfortably. ‘It’s what we do. I mean, we can’t say, go out and shag everything that moves, now can we?’

  I winced.

  ‘So, fancy dress,’ I said, changing the subject. ‘I hate trying to make conversation with Denis the Menace or Darth Vader or… or Peter Pan.’

  ‘Peter Pan wouldn’t be too bad,’ Mum said, savaging another poor sprout. ‘You could go as Tinkerbell.’

  ‘The Peter Pan I had in mind was a nude bloke with just an aluminium pan tied over his willy.’

  Mum looked mystified. ‘I don’t get it.’

  ‘Fancy dress?’ Oh, I just adore fancy dress.’ Vivienne, laden down with expensively wrapped and beribboned presents made her entrance centre stage. A few flakes of melting snow were nestling in the depths of her mink coat like diamonds – she had no truck with animal rights – and she kicked off her heels in obvious relief. ‘We have plenty of outfits you could have a look at down at the Amateurs.’

  ‘You two girls will be staying here tonight, won’t you?’ Mum frowned, ignoring Vivienne. ‘You’ve never not been here for Christmas morning.’

  ‘Yes, of course. We want to be here for when Santa comes. And you’re nearer Josh’s place than the bungalow –that’s if I go this evening. As long as Dad does his usual bacon and sausage sandwiches and Buck’s Fizz.’ It was a Maddison family tradition that while Mum tussled with the turkey, working out how long to give the beast as well as how to actually get it into the oven, Dad was in charge of breakfast and booze.

  ‘Well, make the most of it.’ Mum said evenly. ‘Next year I’m taking your dad to Costa Rica.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’ I nudged Mum once more to make sure she got the message. ‘You have responsibilities to your family here. It’s the law that while you have children at home you have to continue all family traditions until they leave.’

  ‘I thought they had left,’ Mum said, glaring at Vivienne, who was admiring herself in the mirror, flinging an expensive-looking scarf around her – allegedly – lifted neck.

  ‘Now,’ trilled Vivienne. ‘What I suggest – it really is a hoot – is that you wear just a pair of rather naughty white shorts: I did it once at one of darling Roger’s parties.’

  ‘Roger? Roger who?’ Mum sniffed. ‘The lodger? The dodger…?’

  ‘Moore, Kate. ‘Roger Moore. Superb parties he used to give.’

  ‘So, just a pair of white shorts?’ Mum asked archly. ‘Nothing on top?’

  ‘You can wear what you want on top,’ Vivienne replied patiently, ‘but you’ll need a big black handprint on your bottom, Charlie.’

  ‘Why?’ Mum and I looked at one another.

  ‘Sports Night with Coleman!’ Vivienne beamed triumphantly.

  Mum tutted and I shrugged, still in the dark.

  ‘It went down a storm – showed off my best asset, which, although I say it myself, was quite a talking point forty years ago. It was a TV sports programme presented by David Coleman. You see? Coal man? A night out with a hot coal man?’ Vivienne started to chortle. ‘Oh, what a blast we had. Now, Charlie, I may still have a pair of white shorts somewhere – I’m sure we’re much the same size. I was playing tennis until fairly recently.’

  I began to laugh too. ‘But no one will get it. No one will have heard of this David Coleman. Is he still ali
ve?’

  ‘Can’t be,’ Mum said shortly. ‘Bet both he and Roger Moore have snuffed it. Now, how about dressing all in blue with a rubber chicken pinned to you and a rope around your neck?’

  ‘Mum, for heaven’s sake…’ I glanced towards Vivienne. We were trying to keep our recent family history revelation quiet.

  Mum’s hand flew to her mouth as she realised what she’d said, but Vivienne was still away in the world of film and TV stars of yesteryear. ‘Sorry, Charlie, that was rather unfortunate.’

  ‘What was it supposed to be then?’

  ‘Chicken cordon bleu.’ Mum started giggling. ‘I just thought of it.’

  *

  I’d been invited to this party of Josh’s and, I realised, it would be churlish not to go. I had to put away all dreams of Christmas Eve with Dominic pouring us both champagne before opening the cufflinks I’d bought, and him then retrieving a black leather box from where he’d hidden it behind the cushion on the sofa, and then me opening the box and staring dewy-eyed at the massive five-stoned diamond ring and then…

  ‘Bloody hell, what are you supposed to be?’ Daisy started laughing the minute she came into my bedroom.

  ‘Isn’t it obvious?’ I had another look in the mirror at the outfit we’d filched from the Amateurs’ wardrobe down at Midhope church hall.

  ‘Not obvious to me,’ Daisy frowned, circling me to get a better look. She took in my drab brown costume, which was already beginning to make me itch. ‘The hunchback of Notre Dame? Mount Everest? A loaf of Hovis?’

  I tutted and attached my brown antlers to my head before turning back to Daisy…

  ‘A tree?’

  … and added the pièce de résistance: my big red nose.

  ‘Ah right, got you. You look very, er, seasonal.’

  I pulled off my nose, unable to breathe. ‘Oh, I’m not bloody going. I look a total pillock.’

  ‘No,’ Daisy placated. ‘Not a total pillock.’

  ‘Do you know, I’ve got a beautiful little black number I bought in that fabulous dress agency across from Harrods. I should be wearing that on Christmas Eve, floating around the flat in London while Dominic goes down on one knee, instead of an effing scratchy home-made reindeer outfit that smells like someone just died in it.’

  ‘Oh, Rudolph is a much better bet than wanker Dominic Abraham. Now come on, man up…’ Daisy started to laugh again. ‘… Reindeer up, I should say and I’ll give you a lift to the party and then you can have a drink. I’m so knackered after waitressing for the last week, me and the dog are going to do nothing but take charge of the sofa and the TV control and wait for Santa to arrive.’

  *

  Hmm, not much consideration gone into that, I thought somewhat loftily as I followed a rather attractive man in a dinner jacket up Josh’s garden path. He turned, pulling a toy gun from his pocket, aiming it at me with two hands. Very James Bond.

  ‘Glorious Twelfth isn’t until August the 12th,’ I laughed. ‘You can’t shoot the livestock until then.’

  Another man in another black tux. Hmm. Oh, and there was another. Oh, slight variation: a very fat man in a white one. Hmm. And, as I stepped into Josh’s house, lots of women – a couple I recognised from school – in black low-cut dresses and rather attractive black leather cat suits. And one woman, looking very chilly but incredibly sexy, in a sort of Ursula Andress-coming-out-of-the-sea sort of way. The shell in her hand was a bit of a giveaway: she was Ursula Andress. An obvious Pussy Galore gave me a mystified look before retreating into the sitting room with yet another man in a tux – a rather lovely midnight-blue one this time. My antlers fell slightly to one side as, taking as dignified a stance as I could, I went to find Josh.

  He was putting the finishing touches to a plate of canapés when he saw me and, turning right round, eyes wide with surprise, burst out laughing. ‘Right. OK, let me guess… Nope, sorry, haven’t a clue. In which James Bond film is there a moose?’

  ‘A reindeer, if you don’t mind. I’ll kill Daisy. She said it was fancy dress – not a specific fancy dress. I’m off home.’

  Josh grabbed my arm as I turned and headed for the door. ‘No, no, don’t, don’t. You look… er… fine. I’ve always fancied reindeers.’ He lifted my nose and kissed me hard. I backed into a chair, my antlers now at sixty degrees to my head. Josh looked quite gorgeous in his black tux and tie, but his eyes glittered and I realised he’d either been drinking heavily or was on something. The latter, I guessed, and this was confirmed when the fat bloke in the white tux appeared demanding ice, a tell-tale white powder underneath his nostril.

  ‘Charlotte? It is you, isn’t it? You look a bit different with that red nose.’ Pussy Galore, a.k.a. Vicky Redfearn from Westenbury Comprehensive, was peering at me, trying to work out if it actually was me. Vicky and I, both big into art, had been thrown together in A level art in the sixth form, but we’d not kept in touch once we’d left for university. ‘Are you up just for Christmas?’

  ‘No, I’m back up for a few months while I project-manage a property belonging to my great-grandmother. Once that’s finished I’ll probably head back to London.’

  ‘Oh?’ Vicky looked me up and down. ‘I took a temporary job teaching art back at Westenbury Comp once I’d finished uni, and seven years later I’m still there.’

  ‘Really?’ I didn’t quite know if to congratulate or commiserate with her. There was no clue on her rather deadpan features as to which way might be best, and I left it that, the word hanging in the air between us.

  ‘These parties of Josh’s are becoming quite legendary,’ she said, knocking back her glass of wine in one before reaching for a bottle on the table behind me. She lowered her voice. ‘There’s always a theme… Mind you, I’m sure he’s done James Bond before. Or was that Mr and Mrs Smith? Vicki frowned and shrugged. ‘Between you and me, Charlotte, I was really hoping for a Top Gun-themed party. I’ve got such a thing about Tom Cruise and I have fantasies about being Charlie the flight instructor – you know, Kelly McGillis – zooming off on Tom Cruise’s bike. Hell, it makes me horny just thinking about it.’

  I stared at her, my antlers shocked back up to a jaunty seventy-degree angle as Vicky elaborated her erotic fantasies.

  ‘The best one was last summer when it was Pride and Prejudice. The blokes were Colin Firth and although there wasn’t a lake to jump in – I did suggest to Josh that we might all go up to the res at Robin Wood – he had a hosepipe in the garden that did the trick. Good do, that.’

  ‘Charlie, you’ve not got a drink.’ Josh was at my side stroking my reindeer bottom. He handed me a glass of champagne. ‘Or there’s coke, if you’d rather?’

  ‘Coke? Gosh, no, it’s Christmas,’ I twittered. ‘I need alcohol. You know, to get into the party spirit. You haven’t got a little black dress lurking anywhere, have you, Josh? Left behind from one of your old girlfriends, maybe? And then I can get out of this bloody reindeer outfit?’

  ‘Well, I can certainly help you out of the outfit,’ Josh grinned lazily, reaching for the zip at my neck. ‘I can’t promise there’s anything to replace it, though. Now, I’m going to keep the food and drink coming and then we can get started.’

  ‘Get started?’ As Josh disappeared with his tray of food, I turned to Vicky. ‘As in?’

  ‘As in, go and have a look at what’s on offer. And then, knowing Josh, he’ll probably have some James Bond porn on film. Come on, see if there’s anyone you fancy?’

  Shocked, my antlers shot back up to a full ninety degrees as I followed Vicky through the house. A James Bond grabbed Vicky and, after kissing her very thoroughly, grinned and said, in a dreadful faux Sean Connery accent, ‘I’m shaken, I hope you’re stirred’ before turning back to whom I assumed to be Octopussy, rather dumpy bare white legs akimbo as she sprawled across him.

  ‘Terrible Scottish accent,’ I tutted before obediently falling in line behind Vicky once more.

  ‘Who? Fraser?’ She gave me a strange look. ‘He’s from Aberdee
n.’

  ‘Right.’ I was beginning to sweat – whether from the polyester reindeer suit or embarrassment at stepping round, and over, enthusiastically going for it, couples. ‘You Only Live Twice’ was belting out through Josh’s expensive Bose speakers as a tall girl, dressed from head to toe in gold, danced by herself.

  ‘What do you reckon?’ Vicky asked almost proudly before downing more alcohol.

  ‘I reckon I’m going home,’ I said, a rictus of a smile on my face. I caught sight of myself in one of Josh’s mirrors: my red nose and clenched teeth were not conducive to my copping off with any one of these pillocks, had it ever been my intention to do so.

  ‘Oh, don’t be daft. You’ve only just arrived. Come on, loosen up, have a drink or a line and relax.’ Vicky looked me up and down once more. ‘And don’t worry about being a reindeer: once the party gets going you can get your kit off and be who or what you like.’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Josh, his pupils huge, caught up with us in the conservatory and grinned down at me. He took my hand and led me to a vacant sofa. ‘So, Rudolph,’ he breathed, pulling on my zip once more, ‘what would make you hot? This?’ Josh slipped a cool hand under the rough brown fabric and found my nipple, stroking it until it hardened under his touch. ‘What would make you moist?’

  Aagh! That word! Moist. Even worse than giblets. ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, Josh,’ I snapped. ‘I’m going home. This is like being fifteen again and at a teenage party, seeing how far you can go. Jesus.’ I stood up, righted my antlers, snapped my nose back into place and, without a backward glance, made for the front door.

  22

  It was snowing. Miserable sleety stuff that you don’t think will settle but, when you look down at the pavement, there’s a transparent covering that, make one false step and it will have you on your backside.

  I skidded down Josh’s drive, cursing myself for leaving my coat in his kitchen. I’d made a grand exit from his ridiculous party and there was no way I was going back in.

  I came to a stop at the end of the garden, fished for my phone in my bag and tried every taxi firm in the town. Each call, if it was answered at all, was met by either rudeness or hilarity.