I shook my head.
‘Yes you do,’ she encouraged. ‘He used to walk his dog past our house. Every day!’
‘Ohhh,’ I exclaimed dramatically. ‘That Mr Wilson.’
‘Dead,’ she declared. ‘He didn’t have cancer, though. Something wrong with his pancreas, I think.’
‘It was pancreatic cancer,’ my dad said, snapping his fingers. ‘Went like that.’
‘Patrick Swayze, Steve Jobs and Mr Wilson who walked his dog past our house.’ I stared out of the window. ‘Pancreatic cancer certainly has claimed some of the greats.’
I was fairly certain I heard my dad turn a laugh into a cough, but it was covered up by my mother’s continuing list of obituaries. To take the edge off it, I swiped my phone into life and checked for messages. Nothing. Nothing from Jenny to say she was on her way, nothing from Alex to say he’d lain awake all night sobbing into my vacant pillow, and, most importantly, nothing from Louisa to apologize for leaving me at the mercy of my parents.
‘And her from the post office had another baby,’ my mum carried on. We’d exhausted the funeral roll call and moved on to who had had a baby and whether that baby was in or out of wedlock. ‘And Briony, who you went to school with − she’s on her third. Third! Two different dads, though. And of course there’s Louisa’s little Grace. What a beauty.’
‘Speaking of Louisa …’ I leaned forward to rest my chin on my mum’s seat. ‘Where is she?’
‘Oh, Grace was a bit colicky this morning and she couldn’t leave her,’ she replied as though my best friend abandoning me was no big deal. ‘Your priorities change when you have a baby, Angela, as you will find out. You’re not the centre of the universe, you know. Louisa has a husband and a baby and they always come first.’
That was my cue for major sulking. Mostly because while part of me knew she was right, another much larger part of me still thought Louisa should have let said husband take care of said baby, seeing it was a Saturday, and be at Heathrow as promised. Sinking back into the back seat of the car, I turned my gaze out of the window again and watched the motorway whizz by. It felt strange to be on the wrong side of the road. It felt strange not to see any yellow taxis. It felt strange to hear my mum and dad’s voices and Radio 4. It felt strange to be in England. Every second we sped closer to home, we sped further away from New York. It was like it was all falling away, as though it had never happened. And that was a thought I did not want to even entertain.
‘First things first − kettle on,’ my mum stated, dropping her handbag onto the table like she always did while my dad went into the living room and turned on the TV like he always did.
I stood in the middle of the kitchen, clutching my handbag to my body, trying not to cry. That had definitely happened before, but it wasn’t standard behaviour. I didn’t know what exactly I was expecting from my parents’ house, but nothing had changed. Not a single thing. The bright yellow wall clock was still running five minutes ahead. A box of PG Tips sat open next to the kettle, as always, even though the tea caddy was completely empty. The spare keys still sat in the hot pink ashtray I had made out of Fimo when I was twelve. The sun shone through the window, right into my eyes, reminding me to move.
‘Are you going to stand there all day?’ my mum said, turning to me and filling the kettle from the filter jug as she spoke. ‘Are you tired?’
‘Not really,’ I lied. I was completely exhausted, but it was more that this was all too much to take in. I was suffering complete sensory overload and I was worried that if I went up to my room and found the Boyzone posters on the walls, I might lose it completely. ‘Might have a lie-down in a bit.’
‘Well then, we’d better hear the story,’ she said, settling the kettle in its cradle and sitting down at the kitchen table, an expectant look on her face. ‘Let’s see it.’
For a moment, I thought she meant my end-of-term report, but then I realized she meant my engagement ring. Because I was engaged. To a boy. In America. I stayed frozen still in the middle of the room and held out my hand, fingers spread, eyes wide.
‘I haven’t got my binoculars, Angela,’ she sighed. ‘Come here.’
Reluctantly, I dropped my bag and moved over to the worn, wooden table. Same place mats, same salt and pepper shakers, same artificial sunflowers in the centre. Before I even sat down, my mum grabbed my hand and yanked it across the table. My dad bounded over like an overexcited teenager.
‘Ooh,’ he cooed. ‘It’s very nice.’
‘It is, actually,’ Mum agreed, sounding surprised. ‘Shame he didn’t bother to ask your father’s permission, but still. At least it’s tasteful.’
‘Why wouldn’t it be?’ I asked. Mistake.
‘Well, who knows what an American thinks is an appropriate engagement ring. You could have ended up with God knows what on your finger, couldn’t you? Unless you chose it. Did you choose it?’
She almost sounded hopeful.
‘I’m not marrying Liberace, Mother,’ I pointed out. ‘Alex chose it. All on his own. And it’s beautiful. I couldn’t have picked anything I’d love more.’
‘I said it was nice.’ She pursed her lips and brushed her grey-blonde hair behind her ears. ‘And should I bother to ask when and where you’re planning on getting married? Or are you going to tell me you’ve already run off to Vegas?’
A coughing fit was not what you wanted when you already felt post-plane pukey, but I managed to get over it and keep the conversation going and headed off any difficult questions. ‘Early days,’ I spluttered. ‘But it’ll be very low-key. Town hall, dinner, small party, that kind of thing. Don’t bother booking St Paul’s or St Patrick’s.’
‘What’s St Patrick’s?’
‘The cathedral in New York.’ I waved a dismissive hand. ‘I just don’t want all the drama. Something nice with all the important people and lots and lots of boo—’
It was scary how many of my own expressions I could see on my mum’s face. This particular visage suggested she was not amused.
‘Lots and lots of beautiful flowers.’ I corrected. Too late.
‘You’re telling me your wedding is going to be a piss-up in a brewery. In a New York brewery.’
‘I never mentioned a brewery.’ This was true.
‘But you want to get married in New York?’
‘Not necessarily.’ This was not entirely true.
‘Angela.’ Mum showed me the same face I pulled at our local Mexican place when they told me they had no guacamole.
‘We haven’t made any decisions. And it’s not like you’re on the no-fly list, is it?’
She looked down at her fingernails for a moment.
‘Is it?’
Finally, she looked up and turned her blue eyes on me. ‘So. This Alex.’
‘Don’t talk like I’ve just dragged him home out of the bins behind the supermarket,’ I said. ‘You’ve spoken to him on the phone, you’ve seen pictures, I’ve told you everything.’ Obviously not everything. ‘I’ve known him nearly two years.’
‘And you knew Mark for nearly ten,’ she replied, holding up a hand to cut me off. Just as well I was tired or I would have swung for her. ‘I’m just saying, before he gets here, that you need to be careful. You’ve been away over there and I’m sure your head’s been turned, but you’re home now and I want you to think very, very carefully before you make any rash decisions.’
‘This is about as rash as it gets,’ I said, holding up my ring again. ‘Mum, there’s nothing to worry about. Alex is lovely. You’re going to meet him and you’re going to praise the day I met that man.’
‘We’ll just see about that,’ she said, her lips pursed almost as tightly as my dad’s. Clearly it wasn’t just my mum who had a problem with me marrying ‘an American’. Although, to be fair, my dad had never been that keen on Mark either. Or anything else with a penis that came within fifteen feet of his little girl. Bless him. ‘And what’s this about Jenny coming to stay as well?’
‘She jus
t needed a bit of a break,’ I said, trying to suppress a yawn as the kettle rumbled to a boil across the kitchen. Dad got up to mash the tea without waiting to be told, just like Alex. These were the real signs of true and lasting love. ‘There was this bloke and he was messing her around and …’
I paused, looked up and saw my mother’s lips disappear altogether. ‘And she was just desperate to meet you,’ I continued, pulling a one-eighty and trying to get her back on side. ‘As soon as I told her I was coming home to see you, she insisted on coming with me. Wouldn’t hear of me coming without her. She totally loves you.’
‘She totally loves me, does she?’ She shook her head. ‘Totally?’
Smiling, I pulled my hair behind my head, slipped the ponytail holder off my wrist and tied it up high. ‘Totally.’
‘You cut your hair.’ Mum took her mug from my dad and placed it to her lips, steaming hot. Asbestos mouth, she always said. ‘And it’s blonder.’
‘I thought it was quite long at the minute,’ I frowned, flipping the length through my fingers. ‘But yeah, I got highlights. I wanted it to look nice for the presentation. And your party.’
‘I think we probably need to talk about this presentation, don’t we?’ she said. ‘We don’t know exactly what it is you’re doing, you know.’
At last. A topic on which I couldn’t fail to impress.
‘It’s a new magazine,’ I started. ‘Me and my partner Delia came up with the concept, and the publisher liked it so much they want us to launch it in New York and London at the same time.’
‘Hmm.’ Mum stared out of the window.
Not the reaction I’d been looking for.
‘Bit risky, isn’t it?’ she asked. ‘Don’t you think, what with you getting married to a musician, that you really ought to stop playing around and think about a proper job?’
Oh. Wow.
‘One of you should have something steady, surely?’
I didn’t have an answer. I didn’t have anything.
‘So you don’t like my hair then?’ I asked. ‘Bit too much of a change?’
I knew I’d made a mistake as soon as I’d said it. Aside from one other term of endearment starting with a ‘c’, change was the filthiest word in the English language in my mother’s house.
‘It’s shorter than when I last saw you,’ she pointed out, reluctantly going with the subject. ‘And I’d have thought you’d have had enough changes of late without messing about with your hair.’
‘I think it looks nice,’ my dad said, placing my cup in front of me. My Creme Egg mug that had come with an Easter egg fifteen years earlier. ‘Very “ladies in the city”.’
‘Thanks, Dad.’
I sipped my tea carefully and felt every muscle in my body relax. Louisa had sent tons of teabags to me in New York, so I couldn’t tell if it was the mug, if it was the water or if it was just sitting in my mum’s kitchen being talked down to by my parents, but this was the best cup of tea I’d had in two years.
‘Get that tea down you, we haven’t got all day,’ Mum bossed, necking her scalding-hot cuppa as though she was doing an impression of Jenny with a Martini five minutes before the end of happy hour. ‘Do you need to use the loo or can I go?’
‘Why haven’t we got all day?’ I was confused. What was going on? Why wasn’t I getting a beautiful, emotional family reunion? Why weren’t there cakes? I thought I could count on at least a KitKat. At least. ‘Why do I need to use the loo?’
‘It’s Saturday.’ She stood up and looked at me like I’d gone mad. ‘Just because you’re here, the world hasn’t stopped turning. Now, are you going to have a lie-down or are you coming with us?’
Every single atom of my being said have a lie-down. Everything I had learned in twenty-eight years of life said go upstairs and go to sleep. So obviously I picked up my handbag, waited for my mum to come out of the loo and followed her out of the front door.
‘So I said to Janet, I’m not disputing the fact that you’ve been here since half nine,’ my mum said, carefully weighing the difference between two courgettes, narrowing her eyes and placing the bigger one in a little plastic bag. ‘I’m just saying I finished at three and I’ve got things to do. Why should I hang around late because she wants to leave early?’
‘You shouldn’t, love,’ Dad confirmed, passing her a bag of King Edwards for approval. ‘Do we need onions?’
‘Get one big one,’ she replied. ‘I might do a spag bol tomorrow. For the American girl.’
It turned out my mother’s idea of an emotional family reunion was a quick turn around Waitrose. At midday on a Saturday.
‘I need to get some milk,’ I said, walking away from the trolley without proper approval. This was tantamount to going AWOL − my mother looked like she was ready to court martial me right up the arse.
‘I’ve got milk,’ she said, waving her list at me. ‘Why do you need more milk?’
Twisting my engagement ring round and round and round, I shrugged. ‘I’m going to see if they’ve got any lactose-free stuff. Alex is lactose intolerant.’
Both my mum and dad froze on the spot. My dad looked like he might cry.
‘It’s not catching,’ I said. ‘He just can’t digest milk easily.’
Mum pressed a palm to her chest and visibly paled, while my dad hung his head, presumably seeing visions of feeble lactose-intolerant grandchildren failing to return the football he had just kicked to them.
‘The woman who did my colonic says I’m a bit intolerant too,’ I added, waiting for a reaction. But there was none. There was only silence. Picking the list out of my mum’s hand, I scanned it and popped it back between her thumb and forefinger. ‘So we make a good pair. I’ll get the stuff for the pasta.’
‘Angela,’ she said in her kindest, most pleading voice. ‘You didn’t really have a colonic did you?’
Sometimes, I thought to myself, it’s kinder to lie.
‘Yes, I did, Mum,’ I replied. ‘In fact, I’ve had two.’
And sometimes, I just couldn’t be bothered.
If I wasn’t disorientated enough from the overwhelming jet lag that kept threatening to take my legs out from under me, roaming around Waitrose looking for tinned tomatoes and spaghetti just about pushed me over the edge. The only thing that kept me moving was the lure of the Mini Cheddars I’d promised myself. I moved through the aisles of the supermarket like they were full of treacle, my legs heavy and tired. Dodging trolleys and pushchairs and what seemed like dozens of sixteen-year-olds in green uniforms with cages full of Old El Paso fajita dinner kits, I was on autopilot. Maybe I wasn’t home after all. Maybe the plane had crashed and I was in purgatory. There couldn’t be any other explanation for the way I was feeling, the way nothing had changed in the slightest.
Well, nothing had changed but me. I looked like shit. I stopped by one of the freezer cabinets to be quietly appalled at the price of Ben & Jerry’s and caught sight of my reflection. Transatlantic travel did no one any favours. Even following Jenny’s advice hadn’t helped me; sometimes you can drink two litres of water, spend the entire flight getting up and down to go to the loo, smother yourself in Beauty Flash Balm and still deplane looking like you’ve flown in directly from a two-week vacation with the crypt keeper. My skin looked crap, my hair was greasy, and whatever long-lasting, no-smudge mascara I had been wearing was either missing or smudged. Because cosmetics companies were liars. Why couldn’t we all just agree that bruise-like swipes of grey and black etched into the fine lines around your eyes were sexy? Why did we make life hard for ourselves? Maybe I could put it in Gloss as a trend. Maybe I could put it out of business before the first issue even got out.
‘Angela?’
Oh no. I bit down hard on my dry, chapped lips and closed my eyes. Maybe if I didn’t open them again, the voice would go away.
‘Angela, is … is that you?’
How could this be happening? I’d been in England for less than three hours, I hadn’t even had time to change
my pants, and yet this − this − was happening? Holding my shopping out as my last defence, I turned round, offering absolutely everything I owned to every deity ever conceived if they would open up a hole in the ground for me to jump into.
‘It is you.’ Mark, my ex-fiancé, stood in front of me, smiling. ‘Wow.’
No disappearing hole. Just an arsehole. Five foot ten of cheating scumbag shithead gurning like the total bell end he was, holding onto a trolley as though he was going to charge me with it. How come he got a weapon and I didn’t? I quickly looked around, trying to find something deadly. It was like The Hunger Games meets MasterChef.
‘Hi,’ I said. Thanks to my bushel of cheesy snacks I couldn’t even put a hand through my hair, couldn’t try to wipe away some of my errant eyeliner. ‘Well.’
‘Well.’ He rapped his fingers on the handle of his trolley, keeping it ever so slightly mobile. ‘Fancy seeing you here.’
‘Fancy,’ I replied. This was unfair in every way. I needed to have a very serious conversation with whoever was in charge about how incredibly shit my day had been going so far.
‘Um, so this isn’t New York?’ He had always had a talent for stating the obvious.
Mark, like everything else I’d come across so far, hadn’t changed a bit. His hair was still ever so slightly too long, his jeans were still ever so slightly too big, and he looked almost as uncomfortable as he had the last time I’d laid eyes on him. At least he didn’t have a skinny blonde wrapped around his waist this time, so I suppose I should have been counting my blessings.
‘I heard you were still there.’
‘I am,’ I said quickly, shuffling my shopping in my arms. ‘I mean, not now, obviously. I’m back for Mum’s birthday.’
‘Of course,’ he nodded, every moment growing more awkward than the last. ‘I was supposed to be going this week, but the deal fell through and, well, you know how work is.’