Page 8 of The Three of Us
I nod and the room falls silent. Mum takes a sip of her tea and stares into the space in front of her. ‘Well, I’m not sure she’ll catch one of those either unless she loses a bit of weight. A lot of weight, in fact. Now, where’s Sam? If he’s managed to pick us a few nice tomatoes, we’ll have them with our lunch. Help to counteract all those calories you’ve been stuffing.’
When my brother comes in his boots are covered in mud. He nods at me, says ‘Hi, Carls. All right?’ in his usual monosyllabic way, and then Mum makes a big fuss about him taking the boots off and leaving them on a sheet of old newspaper and scrubbing his hands clean before he’s allowed to step across her clean floor or come anywhere near her, or me.
I like the fact that Sam has taken over Dad’s old allotment. There’s a kind of continuity about it somehow. The same routines, the same old moans about the mess from Mum, the same line-up of misshapen vegetables which, in Sam’s less expert care, always seem to have a lot more nibble holes in them than in Dad’s day.
‘What have you two been chatting about then?’ he asks, dropping a carrier bag of his latest crop onto the counter, clicking the kettle back on until it boils and making himself a mug of instant coffee.
‘Nothing,’ we both say in unison.
He laughs. ‘Ah, it’s like stereo in here. Or an echo! You two are so alike.’
I close my eyes and sigh. Alike? Me and Mum? God, I do hope not.
‘I hope you’re going to clean those, Sam,’ she says, nodding towards whatever he’s got in the bag. ‘I don’t want another caterpillar crawling across my plate. Especially as we have a guest for lunch.’
‘I’m hardly a guest, Mum,’ I say, grinning at Sam, who’s inspecting a lettuce at close range and making little creepy-crawly movements with his fingers behind Mum’s back.
‘Oh, I don’t mean you, Carly, love. I mean a proper guest. And he should be here any minute, so I’d go and run a comb through that messy hair of yours if I were you. First impressions are so important and we want you looking your best, don’t we?’
‘Who is it?’ It will be one of her cronies from the bridge club probably, some elderly widower in need of a home-cooked meal. ‘Anyone I know?’
‘Not yet, Carly, but you’ll like him, I’m sure.’
I’m just about to ask her who he is and where he’s come from when the doorbell rings and she’s up out of her chair, whipping her apron off and moving down the hall, pushing me towards the downstairs cloakroom with a hissed ‘There’s a comb in there. Sort out your hair, and then come and meet him. We’ll be in the dining room. His name’s Anthony. With an H that you’re supposed to pronounce, apparently.’
That’s when the penny drops. She’s doing her best Emma Woodhouse impression and matchmaking again. Trying to fix me up with whoever it is she thinks is going to be good for me. Someone probably horribly unsuitable. Old, or ugly, or… well, not Jack, basically. Trapped behind her as she opens the front door, I am only too aware that, no matter how gruesome this Anthony with an H turns out to be, I’m going to have to grin and bear it. There is no escape.
Chapter 7
Molly
Jack rushes out of the door on Monday morning, slamming it behind him, a slice of toast in one hand and his briefcase in the other, still muttering under his breath about oversleeping because he didn’t hear the alarm that she knows only too well he forgot to set. Molly laughs out loud as an image of the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland pops into her head, the anxious creature late for a very important date, peering at its watch and scurrying away down a hole in the ground. Not that different from Jack really, worried about being late for work, checking his Omega every few seconds and dashing off to disappear down the steps into the Underground.
Molly rolls over in bed and stretches. Jack’s side is still warm and smells slightly of sweat, the T-shirt he slept in lying tossed in a hurried heap across her feet. There is nowhere she has to be, no meeting she is in danger of missing, no boss waiting to tell her off. She should feel good about that, but somehow it just makes her feel aimless, a woman without purpose. They have only been here just over a week, and she knows there’s no real hurry, but she needs something to do. A job, a hobby, a friend… something.
She stands under the shower until the water runs cold, not sure if that’s because she has lingered too long with the new luxurious lotus blossom shampoo she found, quite unexpectedly, on the shelves at Rick’s corner shop, or down to the inadequacies of the boiler. Still, she emerges refreshed and squeaky clean, from the ends of her hair to the tips of her toes and, slipping a robe on, she heads to the kitchen and makes herself a coffee and a bowl of porridge, slicing a banana over the top.
Over the last couple of days, she’s been remembering what Jack said, about her having a go at making celebration cakes from home and selling them. It’s tempting, but she doesn’t know much about starting a business, and the kitchen is probably much too small. Wedding cakes take up a lot of room, and a lot of time, with their multi-tiers and their intricate decorations, and it’s not as if she can just shove one out of the way mid-icing when it’s time to make their own dinner. There isn’t even enough cupboard space to store all the ingredients, let alone room in the tiny oven for more than a couple of shallow tins at once. She lets her mind drift. Small kitchen, small business, small cakes. There is a lot to be said for starting small. They don’t have to be giant creations after all, do they? Maybe kids’ birthday cakes, shaped like princesses or dragons. She’d enjoy making those, but parents of little children weren’t known for being flush with money and could more than likely find what they want in the supermarkets a lot cheaper. Or cupcakes, as Jack had suggested. They were everywhere these days. In different colours and flavours, all beautifully piped with buttercream and decorated with edible flowers or butterflies, and each one selling for more than her mum would have paid for a whole box of six back when she was a kid and eating the plain old chocolate in a fluted paper-case kind. There had to be a market for something like that in London. People with money, wanting beautiful things and prepared to pay over the odds for them, not to mention all the offices where someone always wants something a bit more special than a packet of supermarket fairy cakes to share with their colleagues on their birthday or when they’re leaving. But there would be a lot of competition, especially here in London. Other companies and home bakers with exactly the same idea. Bound to be.
She sits at the small table, with her coffee going cold in front of her, and starts making up names in her head. Names for a business that doesn’t yet exist. Something suitably cakey but with her own mark stamped on it, that’s what’s needed. Molly’s Munchies, maybe? Or Molly’s Miracles? It would certainly be a miracle, her managing to start up a successful business! She toys with using just a string of M’s in front of her name, as in Mmmmolly’s, with Mmm meaning yummy, of course, but would anyone get it? Or know how to spell it? When she’s exhausted the M’s, she starts work on the D’s. Doherty’s Dreams? Doherty’s Delights? Her surname would certainly work well enough if she was making doughnuts. Doherty’s Doughnuts does have a certain ring to it. She smiles at her own unintended pun, thinking of doughnuts in the shape of a ring. But none of those names really bring luxury cakes to mind, do they?
She grabs a pen and a slip of paper and starts scribbling ideas down, the way she used to at school, in some sort of spider shape, all spilling out across the page without letting herself think too much about it. Random words that speak cake, loud and clear. Sugar, sweet, sticky, sickly… No, not sickly! She doesn’t want to put people off! Delicious, delectable, dainty, tasty…
She puts the pen down and sits up, closing her eyes for a moment to clear her head. It’s no good. She’s no businesswoman, she’s just a cook. No better and no worse than a hundred other cooks. Who is she kidding? There’s a huge step, or a whole staircase of very steep steps, between coming up with some vague idea and actually making it work. Money and advertising and hygiene certificates, not to mention delivery, especially as they have no car. Not that she has ever learned to drive. The local bus between villages and a willing dad or reluctant husband to drop her at a friend’s house when necessary had served her well enough until now. No, she should forget all about any sort of business of her own and get out there and look for a job. An ordinary job in a shop or a café somewhere nearby. Even thinking about anything more ambitious than that makes her feel sick.
Molly can’t finish her breakfast. In fact, she suddenly realises, as a strong waft of the pungent vapour from her untouched coffee reaches her nostrils and her stomach starts to churn alarmingly, that she really is going to be sick.
She only just makes it back to the bathroom, kneeling on the floor with her head over the toilet bowl as clumps of undigested porridge force their way back up and the room takes on the smell of rotting banana. Her tummy really aches now, with all the strain of bringing everything up. Oh God, it must be something she’s eaten. That lasagne she’d put aside half-cooked and then gone back to last night maybe? Two-day old mince was probably not such a good idea. Unless she’s caught some sort of bug? But Jack seemed fine this morning, and she hasn’t been near enough to anyone else she could possibly have caught it from. A glass of cold water should sort her out, then she really should go back to bed and sleep it off.
She flushes the toilet, gets up and rinses her mouth, then goes back into the kitchen. Maybe some paracetamol will help? She has only recently put them into the odds and ends drawer. Having only just moved in, she still knows exactly where everything is, right down to the last battery, reel of Sellotape and paperclip, and most of them are right here in this drawer. She takes two tablets out of their foil and swallows them, already feeling a bit better. She’ll probably be okay again by lunchtime if she takes a little nap.
She drops the packet back in the drawer, pushing a few bits aside to make room. A tube of superglue. Spare keys. Her diary, the small pocket-sized one that she doesn’t bother keeping in her bag anymore, now she has no appointments to worry about. And that’s when it hits her. Why didn’t she think of it before? She picks up the diary and flips to the page for this week. Jack’s mum’s birthday is coming up on Saturday. She must get a card, post a present or order flowers, remind him to ring. She turns the pages back, to their moving date last week, their anniversary the week before that. Five years already! And back again, and again, page after page until she finds it. The little tick she makes on period days. Always has, ever since she was thirteen and her first sight of bloodied knickers had almost frightened the life out of her. It’s the first tick she’s come to, and it’s – what? Nine weeks ago? Ten? She turns the pages again, slowly, one by one, but there are no more recent ticks than that. How can she not have noticed? Realised? Or did she just forget to tick the last time, what with being so busy with all the stress of the move?
Molly slumps into a kitchen chair and puts her hand instinctively to her tummy. The tightening waistband, the craving for biscuits, and now the sickness? They all add up to something she hadn’t expected at all. But she is, isn’t she? Expecting? She has to be.
Oh, God, what will Jack say? This was never part of his plan. A new job, a new start, having fun in London. A new life, that’s what he wanted, but nobody ever mentioned this sort of new life. The sort she feels almost sure is growing inside her.
She wonders if Rick sells pregnancy testing kits. He probably does. He seems to sell everything else. Because she has to be sure. It’s the only way to convince herself this is real. She can’t even begin to work out how she feels about any of it until she’s sure it’s real.