Me, You and Tiramisu

Chapter 6

Rachel held her hair-straighteners in mid-air, steam curling softly upwards. ‘He wants us to move in with him?’ She paused. ‘Both of us?’

‘Yes, as lodgers. Sort of. He’s got two spare rooms and is a bit short of cash, and thought we might prefer to live in Richmond rather than Twickenham – the commute’s shorter for both of us and the deli’s downstairs so we’d always have food, and he can cook for us, so no more nasty kebabs, and I stay round there most of the time anyway, and I don’t want you to be lonely here by yourself, and … and … I sort of love him. Sort of.’

Rachel started running her GHDs through the length of her bob again, and then smiled at their reflections in the mirror. ‘That sounds bloody lovely. Say yes.’

Two weeks later the sisters sat in the middle of their living room with a screw-top bottle of wine, surveying the emptiness that surrounded them. They’d spent most of the day painstakingly peeling blu-tac off the walls where a map of the world and some Jack Vetriano prints had once been. Their drawers and cupboards had been squashed into brown boxes labelled STUFF R and STUFF J and yet neither of them was in any hurry to lock the door for the last time.

This flat had been the place of their dreams once; the refuge that they’d talked about since their early teens. It was more than just a place to live for them; it was a symbol of their success. Whenever Jayne had passed a new shop with the signage being hoisted up outside, she’d always pictured the hope of the new owners, the moment when they would gather their family and friends outside on the day of opening and proudly unveil the shop front, switching on the lights to delighted ahhs and oohs, to backslapping and chinks of plastic glasses and short speeches about dreams being fulfilled and new beginnings. This poky flat above a takeaway was that place for the Brady twins. On the day they moved in, they’d sat in exactly the same position on the floor, surrounded by very similar boxes, with another screw-top bottle of wine, elatedly rejoicing their escape from a future of no potential.

Moving to Will’s home was a mere postcode upgrade for Rachel, but for Jayne it was huge. Much like those faith-filled shopkeepers who only had a vague plan and blind optimism to help them sleep at night, she mentally ricocheted between gung-ho whooping at her good fortune and rocking back and forth, head in hands, wondering whether she was making a monumental mistake.

It wasn’t that she doubted Will in any way – she knew he was pretty darn perfect from that first cider-swilling afternoon in the park when they were fifteen, but she couldn’t help feeling that things like this didn’t happen to people like her. Surely it would only be a matter of time before the bubble burst, or the other shoe dropped, or some equally baffling phrase that describes the moment it all goes wrong.

But while Jayne waited for that to happen, they had some shopping to do. And that’s how the three new housemates found themselves in Ikea on a Friday night negotiating over how many tea lights is too many and what they were going to put in the hundreds of box photo frames that were stacked in the trolley. Family photos were overruled by all of them on the reasoning of not wanting to be reminded of their genetic origins – through shame and the desire to forget them for the girls, while Will was content keeping his own photos in his memory box under his bed. He didn’t need to walk past pictures of his parents in the hallway every day to know they were with him. So the consensus was to leave much of the décor up to Rachel, who was describing a jigsaw effect she wanted to create by painting a huge abstract, and cutting it up into rectangles that fitted into each individual frame, ‘art that reminds us to look at the big picture,’ she’d said, or something like that.

‘And a peace lily, we definitely need one of them.’ Will said as he wedged a rather sorry-looking plant into the gap between a new toilet brush and a set of six wooden hangers.

‘How the mighty have fallen.’ Rachel yawned, automatically picking up a white wicker basket and tossing it in. ‘It’s Friday night, people. Friday night. I hope this isn’t an indicator of what life with you will be like, Will, because, truth be told, I don’t think I can cope with this level of hedonism.’

‘I wanted to warn you quite how close to the edge I live, but neither of you would have believed me.’ Will put his hand on top of Jayne’s as she steered the trolley past the woks. ‘And if you both behave, I may well treat you to a £3 plate of Swedish meatballs.’

Later that night Will and Jayne were sprawled on his old leather sofa – which was now beautifully adorned with vibrant throws – and Rachel was slumped in a newly acquired Fatboy beanbag when Jayne judged the moment to be right to casually mention that she was heading down to Devon to see their granny the following Saturday and would anyone like to join her. By anyone she meant both of them. By would they like to join her, she meant they would join her. From the stunned silence that ensued you would have thought she’d said, ‘so I was thinking of draping myself in a Union Jack and going camping in the mountainous region between Pakistan and Afghanistan – is anyone keen on tagging along?’

Will purposely didn’t move his eyes from the television, he had very little inclination to revisit the place where his last days with his mum were played out. ‘Um … next weekend? Saturday’s my busiest day in the shop, um … sorry, sweetheart, you know I’d love to otherwise.’

‘It’s okay, I thought of that and Abi said she wouldn’t mind holding the fort for the day.’

‘Oh. Well the pricing system’s quite complicated and the till is a bastard to work if you don’t know how.’ He shrugged apologetically, ‘Sorry, darling.’

‘She’s coming round on Wednesday after work so you can show her how it all works. Next excuse?’ Jayne turned to Rachel, ‘Oi, sharer of the womb, you’re very quiet over there.’

‘Why the hell do you want to go back down there again? Weren’t you only there a few weeks ago?’

‘It was nearly a year ago and Granny sounded a bit quiet on the phone earlier, so I just thought us all going down would cheer her up, and she always asks what you’re up to, and she hasn’t met Will yet, and I thought it might be nice.’

‘Nice? Don’t get me wrong, Granny’s a sweetheart, but I Skype her every week. I don’t feel the need to physically be breathing the same air as her to fully bond.’

‘So I’m going alone, then.’ Jayne looked from her boyfriend to her sister, ‘By myself. Unaccompanied. Flying solo. Bereft of company. Deserted. Abandoned–’

‘Oh for the love of all that’s holy, I’ll come if that will shut you up!’ Rachel growled. ‘Will, you’re coming too. No arguments. If I’ve got to do this, you’re not getting out of it.’

‘Won’t it take ages to get down there?’ Will asked.

‘Three hours or so, or we could stay over somewhere – make a weekend of it?’ Jayne said.

Rachel and Will both chimed a resounding, ‘No!’ completely in sync.

Despite Jayne putting on re-runs of Doc Martin to get them all in the mood for a spot of South West fun and games, a bleak depression had descended over the spruced-up lounge, which even the fourteen new Summer Fruits-scented candles couldn’t disguise.

Today in Talk Devon we are discussing the frightening topic of a new wave of seagulls that are plaguing the seafronts of South Devon, and having a devastating effect on the profits of beachfront ice-cream sellers. We have Keith on the line from Salcombe. Keith, are you there …?

Will idly flicked the volume down on the radio.

‘What are you doing?’ Jayne yelped, reaching for the dial, ‘I want to hear about the killer gulls.’

‘You can talk the girl out of Devon, but you can’t take Devon out of the girl,’ laughed Will. ‘It’s great, though, a whole phone-in for debating ice cream-loving birds. I would say it’s a slow-news day, but I guess this is headline-making stuff down here.’

‘Don’t come over all townie on us Will Scarlet, you were a Devon boy for a while too, don’t forget.’

As the car took the exit at Newton Abbot and began the all-too-familiar descent along the coastal road towards Pine Grove Residential Home for the Elderly, it was as though someone had pressed the mute button – the mood in the car changed from jovial and jocular to silent and reflective. Rachel and Jayne were staring out of the windows, taking in the familiar sights that they’d grown up with – the sea to their right, the numerous B&Bs to their left, with comedy names like Dunromin and ambitious ones like Water’s Edge.

Small shabby hotels with paint peeling and no-smoking stickers in the windows along with AA rosettes from the 1980s and sad sun-faded signs that permanently said ‘vacancies’ flashed past. Boards outside advertised en-suites and colour TVs, the height of decadence once, and still perhaps a source of misplaced pride for the host. Occasionally you’d get a better class of bed and breakfast, one that deigned to call itself a ‘boutique hotel’. These had wi-fi and individually decorated rooms, which were sometimes even themed, because apparently there are people who want to pay money to come to the English Riviera and stay in a suite called Out of Africa. ‘Cheaper than Kenya and not as far,’ one sign read.

Growing up in a seaside town was a strange experience, Jayne thought. Your town is almost like a timeshare – wholly yours for the crappy part of the year and handed over to coach-trippers as soon as the sun shines. They always felt slightly superior to the grockles – as they called them then – watching them squealing while paddling their pasty white legs in the sea or queuing up for overpriced aniseed balls and fizzy cola bottles in the pick-n-mix at The Pavilion in Torquay. Getting their children’s faces captured in pastels by the resident artist sitting on the steps, who worked in Lidl during the winter months. It’s funny how a holidaymaker’s experience of the town you’ve lived all your life in is so different to your reality. Not once in eighteen years did Jayne buy a pick-n-mix bag of sweets, or get her portrait done.

Pine Grove was an imposing, lavender-clad manor house that had once been a beautiful private home before the owners realised in the 1990s that they had wildly underestimated the upkeep costs of such a grand property and sold it to some eager-eyed developers for bulging pots of cash. Home now to twenty of the area’s most affluent pensioners, it was considered The Place to end your days. Morbidly, much excitement was felt among families on the waiting list whenever news of a resident’s demise hit the grapevine.

Helen Brady, the twins’ grandmother, was the daughter of a wealthy fishing family that owned twenty of the area’s trawlers. After her father’s death in the Second World War, her new husband, Tom, took over the business. He’d been one of the ‘lucky’ ones, making that coveted return journey from France, albeit not as complete, physically or mentally, as he had been when he’d left just days after their wedding. He’d suffered the indignity of having tiny shards of shrapnel embed themselves in his thigh and groin, making him, at the age of twenty, in all likelihood infertile. Helen had borne the news with characteristic fortitude. Twenty years later, just as she was coming to terms with early signs of the menopause, the family doctor had told her the news that she was, in fact, expecting a baby.

Helen and Tom had enjoyed a privileged life in Torquay, living in a large villa that boasted expansive views across the whole of Tor Bay. But even though Helen had never intimated such a thing – she wouldn’t – her granddaughters knew that it must have come as something of a shock when her eighteen-year-old daughter interrupted her quiet idyll by introducing a pair of screaming babies into the equation.

Thankfully their grandparents had stoically risen to the challenge of being the only dependable constant in their drama-filled world. Ever ready to practise spellings, subtly prise off stained uniforms to quietly launder them, listen to their pre-pubescent witterings and whimsy and shoulder their teenage angst with good grace and the benefit of experience and learned lessons. Rachel and Jayne had loved standing on the bench at the end of their garden, hair thick with sea salt being whipped around their shining faces, passing their grandfather’s heavy leather binoculars back and forth between them, excitedly spotting dolphins and feeding the gulls that dipped and swooped over the cliff.

As she had got older and, sadly, alone, Helen had become more introspective, pensively reflecting on the childhood the twins could have enjoyed had she and Tom insisted on raising them, and not given Catherine – Crystal – the benefit of the doubt, again, and again. But hindsight was a wonderful, and quietly destructive, thing.

‘Darlings!’ Her warm, plummy tones greeted the trio as soon as they walked out into the gardens, where she was sitting watching some of the other inmates, guests, how would you describe them? Jayne wondered, enjoy a sedate game of croquet. ‘And this must be the handsome Will I’ve been hearing so much about.’ She started to rise out of her chair, knuckles whitening on the arms, when Rachel and Jayne rushed to push her back down.

‘Granny, sit down.’ Rachel eloquently ordered.

Helen let a little laugh escape, ‘Yes, Sir. How was the trip darlings, was it okay? You must be famished, let me ask them to get a tray of something together.’ She started looking around for one of the staff and raised her veined hand slightly to attract their attention as they sat down on the bench alongside her. ‘I’m so thrilled you came all this way from London. I’m very honoured! Now Will, Jayne and Rachel have told me that you are something of an entrepreneur?’

He smiled and dipped his head slightly, ‘I’m afraid you’ve been duped, Mrs Brady.’

‘Please, call me Helen,’ she interrupted.

‘Helen. I’ve got a very small Italian delicatessen in Richmond selling hams and cheese, that sort of thing, hardly Dragons Den material.’

‘And he makes the most delicious chutneys, Granny. We’ve actually brought you a hamper of things – we’ll get it out of the car in a minute.’

‘How wonderful! You needn’t have brought me anything, though; just seeing you down here is such a joy. Now, tell me, Rachel, have you finished that restaurant you were doing at the airport? The drawings you showed me on Skype looked marvellous. What a wonderful way to start your holiday, having supper in a place like that, have you seen it Jayne? Ask to see her sketches, it looks fabulous.’

The rest of the afternoon passed amiably. Helen proved with every sentence that her memory was as sharp as it had ever been; in fact she had no reason to be in a residential home apart from it being an antidote to her loneliness. One of the things Helen had found most difficult to accept about old age was the sad truth that her best days were behind her. She had spent her whole life assuming that tomorrow would be better than today. That this time next year what she was striving for in this moment would be fulfilled and the ambitious prophecies that kept her awake at night would materialise. That one day she would eat dinner from a street cart in Seoul and see the Northern Lights. She would watch Tosca in the Sydney Opera House and hop on a tram on San Francisco’s California Street. Yet, as she attended the funerals of her parents, her siblings, her husband, she began to reach the startlingly bleak conclusion that she’d had her time. For someone like Helen, whose eyes still danced, this was a horrible realisation.

Jayne was tuned into every nuance of her grandmother’s interaction with Will, silently willing her to love him. She knew this was unnecessary; the mutual adoration society had been launched the minute they met.

Helen had actually remembered meeting him back when he was fifteen. Jayne and Rachel had brought him up to visit her and Tom and camp in their back garden one warm July evening. Will had been given a tent by one of his dad’s friends and even if the three teens had put their pitiful money together they couldn’t stretch to paying the exorbitant peak-season ground rent at one of the hundreds of campsites littering Torbay’s coastline, so they pitched it in Helen and Tom’s garden. Helen had even bought them a small disposable barbecue for them to cook some sausages and marshmallows on, while looking endearingly at her granddaughters’ newfound maturity. Nothing says ‘I’m a grown-up’ more than turning raw food into edible food over a naked flame. Jayne had completely forgotten about this memory until Helen brought it up.

‘It was so funny, your grandpa kept watch on and off during the night from an upstairs window and was incensed when he saw you, Will, crawling out of the tent and spending a penny on his petunias.’

Will’s hand shot to his mouth, blushing redder than Jayne had ever seen him, as he stammered, ‘I can only offer my heartfelt apologies, Mrs Brady, Helen, what can I say? I was fifteen, stupid and had a very weak bladder.’

‘Oh, no need to apologise, it’s made me smile quite a number of times since, thinking about it. Now look, as much as I love having you here, it’s nearly tea time and you need to push off if you’re going to be in London before dark.’ Helen had this thing about getting to places ‘before dark’. It might have been the Blitz mentality of nightfall being quite literal. She added quietly, ‘Now, have you seen your mother lately?’

‘No. And we’re not going to now, either.’ Rachel replied before Jayne could interject with a more diplomatic response.

‘I think you should stop in. She’s a little … different recently.’

‘Different how?’ Jayne asked at the exact-same moment Rachel said, ‘Whatever.’