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I turn and look at him. Whenever Iain’s in the shop, he’s never far from my side. Today he’s wearing one of his customary V-necked sweaters – tufts of chest hair are poking out – and his curious old-mannish trousers that always look a little too tight for his belly. Dropping the sponge wipe into the sink, I check the books he’s chosen. ‘Vehicle Maintenance for Beginners,’ I murmur.
‘Yeah!’
Whilst I am not au fait with Iain’s various conditions, I’d be surprised – and frankly alarmed – if he was ever capable of driving a car.
Small Plot Gardening in Full Colour is another of his choices. But Iain doesn’t have a small plot, or even a balcony. I check more of his books – which he’ll insist on paying for – hoping to find something that might be of use to a single man living alone with a dog. Picture Framing Made Easy, Creative Crafting With Yarn …
‘That’s what I’m going to do,’ Iain says eagerly.
I frown. ‘What, make macramé pictures of owls?’
‘No,’ he sniggers. ‘I mean this one. I’m going to learn to cook.’ He plucks the relevant book from his pile, and I recognise it immediately: a once-popular guide to a savagely punishing dietary regime.
‘We get this all the time,’ I remark. ‘If there was a prize for the most handed-in book, this would win it. It’s because no one can actually stick to it, Iain.’
He pushes back his wonky, possibly self-cut fringe: ‘But it’s full of healthy recipes. Weren’t you saying I should start eating better?’
I shrug in bafflement, having no memory of saying anything of the sort. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Yeah, you did. At the Christmas lunch …’
‘Oh, that. All I meant was, we’d seen the menu beforehand, and you said you were fine with the full turkey dinner. And then, on the day, you decided you didn’t want veg …’
‘I don’t eat veg,’ he says indignantly.
‘You wanted chips,’ I remind him, ‘instead of roast potatoes, and baked beans in place of the sprouts …’
Iain beams at me. ‘Yeah, well, like I said, I’m going to read this and be healthier, like you’re always on at me about …’ This is so not true. I’m never ‘on at’ him about anything, although sometimes I suspect he’d like me to act like a sort of dad-type figure, dispensing advice. Although he mentions his mum occasionally – I gather she struggles with a raft of mental health issues – he’s given the impression that his father was never around. It’s Una, his upstairs neighbour, who seems to keep an eye on him.
‘Well, um, I think that’s great,’ I say, ‘but, y’know, that book was written quite a long time ago, and people don’t really go for her methods anymore …’
‘But she’s a doctor,’ he insists, jabbing the author’s name on the cover.
I pause, wondering whether to break it to him. ‘The thing is, she’s not actually a real one.’
‘But it says it on the book!’ His eyes flash with indignation.
‘Yes, but there’s been some debate about whether her qualifications are real, or if she’s just a bit of a charlatan …’
‘A charlatan?’
‘You know – a cheat, a fake …’ I’m reminded now of a difficult conversation I had with Lori a few years back, when she asked me to tell her straight – no messing – whether Father Christmas really exists.
‘People can’t do that,’ Iain retorts. ‘Not when they write books.’
‘They can, if they have the nerve. I mean, I could call myself a doctor …’
‘But you’d be lying, wouldn’t you?’ He glares at me as if I might be considering it as a possibility.
‘Well, yes. I’m just saying—’
‘How did she write a book then?’ Iain snaps.
‘By sitting at her computer and hammering it out, I’d imagine.’ I catch Iain’s crestfallen expression and regret being so blunt. ‘Look,’ I add, ‘I don’t know for certain, but I do know there was a TV show years ago where she used to examine people’s poos …’
‘Ugh!’
‘And you don’t want to spend your Christmas doing that,’ I remark, but my attempt at a joke seems to appal Iain even further.
‘No, I do not.’
‘It wouldn’t be very festive,’ I add, at which, thankfully, his eyes glimmer with amusement as he finally realises I’m having him on.
‘I don’t want to ever look at people’s poos,’ he adds, ‘unless they’re Pancake’s. And I don’t like it, y’know – I just do it, with the little plastic bags, because you can’t just leave it lying there, can you? Not if you’re trying to be a good citizen.’
‘No, you can’t,’ I say, glancing at the clock now. It’s almost seven p.m., and Iain and I have spent an extra two hours past closing time, sorting donations. I’m paid an okay-ish salary to manage this place, and for the most part I enjoy it. But now I’m seized by an urge to head home, maybe go for a run or meet up with friends, anything rather than be trapped in our dingy back room.
I can tell Iain’s still feeling rattled as he stuffs his books into a carrier bag. In regular shops, where everyone’s paid, you can pretty much expect your team to come in and do their job, and go home; it’s a straightforward exchange of money for labour. A charity shop works differently. While some of our helpers – mainly the elderly ladies – simply enjoy the company and want to make a difference, others are more emotionally entwined with our little emporium.
I started out here as a volunteer myself. I needed something to keep me busy after the Glasgow-based book publisher’s I worked for went bust. It was gutting, really, when it happened. Gander Books had been a tight-knit operation with just the MD, two editors, a couple of admins and myself. After a media course at college, followed by a smattering of casual jobs, I’d been taken on at twenty-three as an admin assistant. Keen and hard-working, I seemed to fit in well, and pretty soon I was promoted until I was taking care of Gander’s publicity, marketing and events. It was a brilliant job, and as book publishing jobs are few and far between in Glasgow, I was happy to stay put.
Gander won literary prizes and Independent Publisher of the Year, and all seemed to be going swimmingly for many years until authors started to complain of advances and royalties being delayed, then not paid at all. The permanent staff were put on ‘emergency measures’ (i.e. drastically cut pay) and finally, after months of uncertainty, the whole place sunk.
We were all bereft. I’d worked there for fifteen years, and the place had felt like a second family. There was no payout for staff, and by then Elaine and I had a four-year-old daughter so I couldn’t hang around, perusing job ads until the ‘ideal’ position came up. For a few years I worked for an events company, building up a second strand in freelance proofreading on the side. When redundancy happened again I decided, to hell with it; the next job I took would really matter to me and what the hell if I took a big pay cut. I’d kept in touch with the manager of the charity shop, and when she decided to move on it felt kind of right to apply.
Iain turns up his jacket collar against the sharp wind as we step outside. ‘It’s great that you want to learn to cook,’ I tell him. ‘But how about you forget that cranky cookbook, and try something simple that doesn’t need a recipe?’
He folds his arms over his substantial stomach as I lock up the shop. ‘Like … salad?’
‘No, not salad,’ I say quickly. ‘How about soup? Something simple like that?’
‘But I just buy my soup …’
‘Okay, but if you’re going do some cooking over the holidays, it’s a good place to start. It’s the easiest thing. Even Lori can make it.’
‘What d’you do, then?’ he asks as we fall into step.
‘Fry up some leeks or onions, then chuck in any other veg, and water. Throw in a stock cube …’
‘Is that all soup is?’
‘Yep, that’s it.’ We fall into companionable silence as we make our way towards the car park. On the days I drive in, Iain tends to accompany me to my car, as if I might be incapable of finding it without his help. ‘Well, enjoy your Christmas,’ I add as we reach it. ‘And good luck with the cooking—’
‘Aw, shit!’ he says as his carrier bag splits, and his books tumble to the ground. As we don’t have another bag for him to carry them home in, he agrees to leave them in my car. Apart from the dog-eared diet cookbook, which he insists on taking home – ‘in case I need it.’ And I watch him, clutching it to his chest as he marches off, leaving waves of indignation in his wake.
Chapter Five
The next day I take Lori for our Christmas Eve lunch. As it’s her mum’s turn to spend the big day with her, this is our festive treat together. My daughter chose the sushi restaurant – because naturally, what you really want in Glasgow in December is chilled rice and raw fish, shunting towards you on a conveyor belt. ‘Shivery food,’ her mother calls it, but in fact, I’m quite happy to be here. Although Lori usually spends a couple of weeknights at mine – plus every second weekend – it still feels kind of special as we perch on our stools and tuck in.
‘So, did you go to the school dance?’ I ask as she swipes her third plate from the belt.
She shakes her head. ‘Decided not to.’
‘Oh, why was that?’
Lori twirls a noodle around her chopstick. ‘You know what they’re like.’
I can’t help smiling. ‘Not really, Lor. I mean, our school dances had Scottish music, and this awful situation of the boys all lined up on one side of the hall, and the girls on the other, and you were expected to walk over and pick someone …’
‘You mean the boys always picked? How is that fair?’
‘It’s not fair. It’s just the way it was …’
‘The girls never picked?’
I laugh and shake my head. ‘I wasn’t responsible for the system, Lor. That was a long time ago …’ I break off, realising she’s dodging my question. ‘Anyway, why didn’t you go?’
She shrugs. ‘I wasn’t allowed.’
‘By who? By Mum?’ I frown at her. It’s unlike Elaine to lay down the law about anything. She let Lori have her ears pierced at ten years old, which I wasn’t delighted about. But what could I have done when I only found out after the event?
‘Mr Fletcher said I couldn’t go,’ Lori says airily, referring to her form teacher. She flicks back her fine light brown hair and studies the conveyor belt. ‘I wish there were those little pancake things. You know the ones with the duck?’
‘Lor, why weren’t you allowed to go?’ I prompt her.
‘Just stupid stuff …’
‘Okay, but what exactly? It seems a bit severe—’
‘I didn’t want to go anyway,’ she says firmly, wrinkling her lightly freckled upturned nose.
She snatches a dish of tuna sushi and spears it with her chopsticks. At fourteen, she wears her long hair pulled back in a ponytail, virtually lives in jeans, T-shirts and baggy sweaters, and shows zero interest in make-up. All of this makes her look, if not younger than she really is, like a girl of her actual age. It’s a relief, frankly. Her best friend Shannon has spray tans and wears terrifyingly thick false eyelashes, like fluttering canopies. She is well into boyfriend territory – livid love bites have been spotted on her neck – whereas, thankfully, Lori still seems to regard boys as mates.
‘It’s not really anything,’ she adds firmly.
‘C’mon, just tell me. I promise not to go on at you, okay?’
She sniffs. ‘Just behaviour and things.’
‘Right. So what kind of—’
‘Dad,’ she says impatiently, ‘just being late for lessons, stuff like that.’ She sighs, and I decide to let it go for now as we tuck into our lunch. ‘So, where are we off to next?’
‘Fancy seeing a film?’
‘Yeah! What’s on?’
Consulting my phone, I run through the list. It’s a madcap comedy we go for, and as Lori and I snigger our way through it – at one point a piece of popcorn shoots from her mouth – I sense my worries about her ebbing away. Never mind her lateness, the school dance, or whatever might be going on in her mother’s life (‘Everything’s fine, Jack! Why wouldn’t it be?’). I have friends whose teenagers would never deign to go to the cinema with them, and it’s one of my greatest joys that Lori doesn’t yet find my company repulsive.
Back at her mother’s pebble-dashed terrace on the Southside, Elaine oohs and ahhs over the presents I’ve bought Lori, which she insisted on opening immediately, littering the living room with torn paper.
‘All that Lush stuff!’ Elaine marvels, arms folded across her dark green sweater. ‘You’re a lucky girl. It’s not cheap in there, you know.’ Behind her, a miniature fake Christmas tree is sitting a little askew on a side table. ‘Get me some henna next time you’re in, will you?’ she adds. I smile; Elaine is the only woman I know who still hennas her hair. Sometimes it’s a startling orangey colour, at other times a deep shade of rust; as a colouring agent it seems rather hit and miss.
Now Lori is enthusing over further gifts of new jeans, a top (incredibly, she still allows me to choose clothes for her), a voucher for trainers and a small wad of cash.
Lori hugs me goodbye, and disappears back into the living room as Elaine sees me out. ‘You’re so good to her,’ she says. ‘Thanks, Jack. So, are you off out tonight?’
‘Maybe. No plans as yet. How about you?’
‘Nope, just a quiet night in for us two.’ She pauses, and as I glance across the garden I can’t help noticing that one of her wheelie bins – the one for glass – is crammed to the point where its lid won’t shut.
‘Look at the state of that,’ she retorts, catching my gaze.
‘It’s pretty full,’ I concede.
She steps further out into the garden, her breath forming white puffs in the chilly air. ‘That’s people dumping stuff in as they walk past.’
I look at her incredulously. If Elaine wanted to lie, couldn’t she have blamed the bin men for failing to empty it? ‘You mean passers-by lean over your wall, open your bin and drop their empties into it?’ I almost laugh.
‘Yeah,’ she exclaims. ‘Can you believe it?’
‘Not really. Not when there’s a perfectly good council bottle bin down the road …’
Elaine purses her lips. Her partying days are long over, she’s always keen to assert; now, it’s just a glass or two of wine in the evenings, and what’s wrong with that?
‘I’ve told you about this before,’ she adds, frowning, although she hasn’t; last time it appeared to be overflowing, she insisted it was ‘mainly olive oil bottles and pickle jars’ (Christ, it sounds as if I’ve created a hobby of monitoring the fullness of Elaine’s bin!).
‘Maybe you should put a lock on it?’ I suggest, at which she regards me coolly.
‘Jack, what are you trying to say exactly?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Obviously you are. Why not just come out with it—’
‘No need to be so defensive,’ I say lightly. ‘It’s Christmas Eve, let’s not start bickering now …’
‘If I’m defensive,’ she shoots back, ‘it’s because you’re bloody sanctimonious!’
Hell, why did I touch on the matter of her drinking now? I should have known better – it achieves nothing – and if we were going to talk about it properly, then it wouldn’t be in her front garden with Lori just a few feet away, inside the house. ‘I don’t mean to be,’ I say levelly. ‘I know I’m not perfect, and I’m not trying to judge—’
‘Not trying to judge?’ she splutters. ‘Well, you are judging. You always have and you’re even worse now, with your running … ’
‘What? I jog up and down the river about three times a week …’
‘… with your personal bests and your fancy sports watch …’
‘Can we leave it please, Elaine?’
She glares at me. ‘Or we could empty the bin if you like, and count the bottles?’
Oh, for crying out loud, why did I let us get into this? ‘Jesus, just forget it okay?’ She blinks at me and, alarmingly, her eyes have filled with angry tears. ‘Are you okay?’ I ask, stepping towards her.
‘I’m fine, thank you,’ she mutters, and I glimpse Lori, briefly, at the living room window before she disappears again.
‘But you don’t seem—’
‘Just go, Jack,’ Elaine adds, turning away, ‘and enjoy your Christmas. Have a fantastic time, tanking into your dad’s Italian wines with your brother …’
‘Elaine …’
‘But that doesn’t count as drinking, does it?’ she snaps. ‘Not when it’s good stuff. It never does.’
That went well, I reflect bleakly as I drive home, hoping that Lori didn’t overhear any of it, and reminding myself that Elaine is an adult woman of forty-five, who can make her own choices in life – and is a pretty good mother by all accounts. Lori is apparently well cared for, adequately fed and sent off to school on time. She never has any untoward stories to tell. I’ve tried to quiz her – gently – about whether everything’s okay with her mum, but Lori just snaps, ‘She’s fine, Dad. Why’re you asking?’ I’ve even made it clear that, if my daughter ever wanted to live with me full-time, that would fine with me, we could make it work – but she’s dismissed it. ‘Mum’s just been a bit unlucky,’ she admitted recently, and maybe it’s true.
When Elaine recently lost her administrative job at a community project, it was apparently due to cuts, and not the copious sick days she always claimed were due to her asthma, and never hangovers. When she fell downstairs and broke her arm last summer, it was apparently due to her tripping over the laundry basket on the landing. Lori backed up her mum’s explanation, and I didn’t want to go on about it. Anyway, without installing CCTV in Elaine’s house, it’s impossible to know exactly what goes on.
Back home now, I let myself into my tenement flat in the part of town that’s being flaunted as ‘the new West End’, which just means cheaper than the West End, and less desirable. I like it though, with its muddle of individual shops with their mysterious vegetables piled up in boxes outside.
In my living room, I open a couple of Christmas cards from cousins down south and place them on the mantelpiece with the others. I, too, have a Christmas tree; Lori would be appalled if I didn’t. And while I can’t claim to have had ‘tons’ of festive nights out, there was a jovial pub gathering with a few of us who’ve knocked around together since I was nineteen, when I first moved here from out in the sticks, up in Perthshire. And now – Mr Popular! – my phone pings; a text from my mate Fergus, reminding me that a bunch of them are meeting for drinks in town. It’s tempting to join them right now but, with the drive up to Mum and Dad’s tomorrow morning, I decide to delay the pleasure of a few beers by going for a run first.
A short while later I’m pounding along beside the river. The Clyde shimmers beneath the dark sky, and traffic nudges slowly over the bridge. I keep close to the railings, wondering now about Mags and Iain, and how they’ll fill their days until the shop opens up again after New Year.
I had considered opening up for those in-between days so they’d have somewhere to go. ‘That’s a bit bonkers, Jack – you need a break too,’ Dinah the area manager had said, and she was probably right. Now it’s Elaine who’s snuck back into my thoughts. Will she remember to defrost her turkey and not try to nuke it in the microwave as she did a couple of years ago? Of course she’s capable of cooking a bird, I tell myself, annoyed with my inability to switch off and ‘get in the zone’, as proper runners are supposed to do. I jog on, all of this stuff whirling in my head like a gigantic stew, and then it all stops – suddenly – when I see her in the distance.
I’m sure it’s her – the woman who helped me in Lush. Yes, it’s definitely her. With her creamy skin and abundant dark brown hair, there’s something incredibly striking about her. She is strolling towards me, head slightly dipped. I slow my pace, wondering if she’ll recognise me and thinking perhaps it’s best if she doesn’t, given I’m wearing my ratty old running gear and slathered in sweat. Of course she won’t; she’s on her phone, seemingly deep in conversation. She stops and rakes a hand through her hair. I stop too, and pretend to check the sports watch I bought in the hope that it would turn me into a bona fide athlete, but which serves only to plague me with its mysterious vibrations and bleeps.
We’re closer now – close enough for me to catch her conversation. ‘Are you sure this is what you want?’ she exclaims, phone clutched to her ear. ‘It sounds like you’re being pressurised, love …’ I fiddle with my watch, wondering why a picture of a weight lifter has appeared on the screen. ‘For God’s sake, Alfie,’ she blurts out, ‘what about the nut roast?’
There’s more muttering, and just as I’m thinking, What d’you think you’re doing, eavesdropping on a stranger’s personal conversation? she finishes the call and shoves her phone into her bag. She stands there for a moment, staring out over the river as if trying to gather herself together, then strides on.
My watch bleeps again. I look down, still catching my breath but cooling rapidly now. Inexplicably, the word ‘Move!’ is flashing on the screen. It’s so bossy, this hideously expensive gadget. I couldn’t make head nor tail of its functions as I squinted at the instructions with the ant-sized print. But now I’m thinking: perhaps it is useful after all? Maybe, on top of monitoring my pulse rate and pace, it can sense my indecision and give me some indication of what to do next?
‘Move! Move!’ my watch commands me.
I move.
Chapter Six
Nadia
Well, that’s just great. Alfie, who has already delayed his homecoming by some days, isn’t spending Christmas Day with me after all. ‘You don’t mind if I spend it at Cam’s, do you?’ he just asked me, when I was expecting him to be rattling towards Glasgow on the train. Cam – Camilla – is his new girlfriend with whom he appears to be smitten.
Do I mind? Of course I bloody mind!
‘So when will I see you?’ I asked, feeling horribly needy as I marched along by the river. I only came down here because he called, otherwise I’d have headed straight home on the subway. Now I’m so agitated I’m just stomping along, trying to calm myself. But there’s no point in getting angry; I know that. He doesn’t care about the nut roast I’ve already made to take to my sister Sarah’s tomorrow.
In truth, I’m not entirely happy about this vegan business – especially as he let slip that Camilla happens to be vegan too. ‘Don’t make yourself anaemic just to impress her,’ I wanted to say when he declared his new dietary principles a few weeks ago – but I had the good sense not to. Instead, I merely suggested that he should read up on nutrition and treat it seriously. Of course I will, he retorted. I’m doing it properly, y’know. I’m not an idiot … Hmmm. I still wasn’t overly delighted. I’m sure veganism is fine, if you’re motivated enough to swot up on all the food groups and soak things for billions of years. I just couldn’t quite imagine my eighteen-year-old son, who used to virtually faint with delight at the sight of a steak, involving himself with pulses.
‘Aw, Mum, I’ll see you the day after Boxing Day, okay?’ he muttered a few minutes ago.
‘The day after Boxing Day?’ I exclaimed.
‘Well, there are no trains till then.’
‘I could come up and fetch you. How about that? Have Christmas with Camilla, and then I’ll drive up and—’
‘Yeah, but they have a massive party on Boxing Day,’ he continued blithely, ‘and Cam says it’s brilliant. Everyone brings musical instruments, there’s a whole jamming thing going on, it sounds mental. There’s so much food and drink, her dad saves his special wine for it and I really wanna be there for that.’ Ah, right. How fantastically fun. Clearly, the thought of us lot sitting around eating Twiglets and playing Pictionary can’t compare to Camilla and The Special Wine. ‘Your nut roast’ll keep, won’t it?’ he added, trying to placate me now.
‘I’m not sure,’ I huffed. ‘I’ll probably have to freeze it. It’s this gigantic boulder made from ground hazelnuts and about sixty-five other ingredients and it’ll take about three weeks to defrost.’