This is fine, p.15
This Is Fine, page 15
‘What? No – they wouldn’t like that,’ she says, shaking her head.
‘You can always try it as one of the specials,’ I say gently. I know why she is scared – she’s spent so long surviving by fitting in. ‘Use it to test what works and what doesn’t. And something like Black Cake – trust me, they’d love it. As you say, it’s basically solid booze.’
‘Maybe,’ she says. ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ The jingle of the door sounds. She sighs and gets up. ‘You’ve done more than enough. Don’t worry about me.’
I follow her into the front and, at the counter, spot one of the most beautiful men I’ve seen in my life. A full head of thick, silver hair. Chin dimple. Slightly oversized ears but a strong jaw like Marlon Brando. Tall and broad, the kind of build you might see on a woodcutter. Even his aftershave is divine: cedar, salt and lavender.
‘Ah, Selena,’ he says, his voice deep and booming. ‘And this must be our new visitor I’ve heard so much about.’ His ice-blue eyes actually twinkle. I thought that was just a thing you read in Mills and Boon novels. I look at him curiously. He clearly expects me to know who he is, but I don’t.
‘This is David Bentley,’ Selena says weakly. ‘Our dear leader and head of the town council. And my landlord. David, this is Padma, who’s staying in Hugo’s place.’
‘Oh, Selena,’ he says with a jovial chuckle, except it doesn’t match his tone. ‘“Dear leader” – you are funny. We’re having an open council meeting later. Four o’clock. With all these new visitors we need to discuss a strategy for how we’ll cope. You are coming, yes?’
‘I would love to, David,’ she replies, ‘but we’ve just had a morning rush and lunch could be as bad. I haven’t any waiting staff to help me and I’ll need to prep for tomorrow …’
‘Ah,’ he says, placing his hands on the counter and leaning in. ‘Well, that is a shame. I might as well tell you that with this new interest in the town, we will have to raise the rent on all our commercial properties.’ He looks at her pointedly and I see him for what he is. A bully. ‘We can hold off for a month because I’m considerate like that.’ Selena’s face crumples at the news, and I know tears are probably not far off. It feels like David knows it as well.
‘You’re welcome to come too, of course,’ he says, switching his gaze to me. ‘I know Hugo would want to be kept abreast of developments.’
I’ve done so much to clear out Rosemary’s house but I am not Hugo’s PA to be taking minutes about a place I’m not sure I’ll return to. ‘Oh, I would love to,’ I say with as big a smile as I can muster, ‘but I’ve promised to do something with my niece.’
He looks at me with a calculating stare. ‘May I have Hugo’s number?’ he asks. ‘I could let him know about developments directly.’ I can hardly say no. Not just because Hugo is technically invested in the area, but because David is the kind of man whose vengeance comes slyly. I don’t want to offend him or refuse in case it has repercussions for Selena.
He leaves with Hugo’s number in his phone, and when the door closes Selena breaks down into tears, hiding her face behind her hands on the counter. I stand next to her and pull her into a hug. She eventually cries herself out and lifts her head.
‘I am already so in debt, Padma,’ she says. ‘Today was busy but what if this surge doesn’t last? I can’t make the rent as it is, let alone if he increases it. And he and his shrew of a wife already own so much of the property here – it’s not like I can go anywhere else.’
I look at Selena and realise there is so much I haven’t been seeing because I didn’t want to. The nails bitten to the quick. The perennially cheery outlook. The red lipstick and cutesy clothes designed to make people think she is jolly and quirky. I hadn’t guessed how much of it was a brave face.
‘Look, let me help you. If there is one thing I know, it’s that Londoners and tourists love being able to get something special and unique that they can’t get anywhere else. And, Selena, that’s you.’
‘But it’s a risk and I’ve already borrowed up to the hilt …’ She wipes her face dejectedly with a napkin.
‘If you continue the way you are, you’re in trouble anyway, right?’ She nods. ‘Well then, why not take a chance on something new?’
She pours herself the last dregs of coffee from the pot and sits down. ‘Tell me what you think I should do.’ There’s a part of me that feels uncertain, an imposter. When I have felt like this in the past, the person I’ve asked for advice is Wallace, and he has always advised me to err on the side of caution. Perhaps because he’s worried that if my expectations are too high, if things crash, he’s seen the place of darkness I might one day return to. But he isn’t here. He hasn’t been for a while.
The anger that surges in me at this realisation, combined with the look I see in Selena’s eyes then – one of deep need – tells me that maybe I can help her pull this off. Just because no one is coming to save me, doesn’t mean I’m not capable of saving someone else.
So we talk. Selena says she can pay me an hourly rate on the days I want to help out in the café, and a fifty per cent cut on anything I make and sell. I tell her that I think she should do a relaunch of the menu. Make a party of it. She says she can’t afford to pay me as a food consultant, but we agree that it’s an official position I can put on my CV afterwards, and she will give me a reference. Slowly, it feels like I am being nudged in the right direction.
*
When I get home, I take off my overheating trainers and tip out the stones. On the walk up, I’d felt the change in atmosphere again: the air tasted of iron, the birds swooping into the trees in hasty flight, and in the distance, thunderclouds gathering, their grey shoulders bunching up against one another. There is no point hoping that Myra had taken an umbrella. She may spend hours on her make-up and endlessly debate which over-the-knee socks to wear, but she hates carrying anything superfluous. I pull out some towels and switch the hot water on just in case she needs a shower on her return.
The wave of optimism I felt at helping out Selena evaporates as my thoughts drift to how Myra has been over the past few weeks. In particular, the last few days when she’s been dealing with something huge – the ongoing rejection by her friends, now her school – but didn’t feel able to tell me. Am I helping her or am I making things worse? I’m tempted to seize the rare opportunity of her being out, to go to her room and find the journal she’s been writing in, to find out how she’s really feeling. The madness almost catches light, an old flame kindled long ago when I would comb my mother’s room for bottles. But just as my foot reaches the second stair, I stop myself. To remove temptation, I head out into the garden, the fresh air providing welcome relief.
Outside I see what Myra has done and it makes me feel proud, and ashamed of myself for doubting her. The fences are fixed and she’s begun painting them. The lettuces are covered with wire netting to stop birds from attacking them, and the chilli and capsicum plants have little nubs growing among their leaves.
The shame I feel at believing the worst of her squeezes the air from my lungs. If I am going to help Myra, I am going to have to be able to trust her, and she is going to have to trust me. Demanding her innermost thoughts in order to protect them would be like taking a crowbar to an oyster. When she needs it, I can guide her along the way. The hard part will be how to do it with grace and faith. Faith that she will be the one to save herself. Grace for when she makes mistakes.
*
When the doorbell rings while I’m making tea – Myra likely forgetting her keys – I yell: ‘It’s open!’
I almost drop the kettle when I see the person standing by the front door.
‘Hugo,’ I say, and he smiles as if he is the spirit of the summer, bringing warmth and light and hope into our home, when we need them most. His face is so friendly and soft, his beard golden-brown in the sunlight that drenches the kitchen at this part of the afternoon. Seeing him strangely brings up all the sadness and upset I’ve been trying to suppress around Wallace, and the loneliness I feel. A wave of homesickness even though he isn’t a place I call home. But also the guilt around mistrusting Myra. Feeling the dam burst around all the emotions I’ve been trying to hold in, I burst into tears.
*
‘Padma,’ says Hugo, looking horrified. His pale blue shirt is crumpled. His hair has a Tintin tuft. ‘I’m so sorry – I’ve been trying to call but I got no answer.’
I wipe the tears from eyes. ‘Sorry, this isn’t you, it’s me.’
‘I’ve heard that before,’ he says wryly. When I don’t smile back, he says, ‘It was a very last-minute thing. I got a frantic message from David Bentley saying there was an urgent town hall meeting. I had the day off anyway, and the drive time wasn’t too bad, so I thought I’d pop in to say hello while I’m here.’ I clamp my hands over my face like a starfish hugging the seabed because I don’t want him to see me crying. ‘I can go if you want me to?’
‘No,’ I say, ‘it’s all right. Honestly. I almost did something I’m not proud of.’
He doesn’t push me to tell him what it is. ‘I’m sure whatever it is, it can be fixed.’
‘How was the meeting?’ I ask, desperate to take the focus off myself.
‘Not urgent, as it turns out,’ he says, rolling his eyes. ‘Just a bunch of blowhards flapping about the influx of tourists, some influencer I’ve never heard of, and five different people asking me if I’m going to sell the house. Which looks amazing, by the way – I hardly recognise it. I can’t thank you enough.’
All the empty boxes, the miscellaneous bin bags full of paper, the rusted cookware, are gone. The electricals, which included five toasters, ten hairdryers, two printers – all broken – are gone too. The kitchen could do with a refit, but the countertops are gleaming, fresh lemons and apples sit in ceramic bowls, and The List that Myra and I regularly add to is pinned to the fridge. The latest addition is No Air Supply/Cradle of Filth before 10 a.m., which sits under No Cheese Doritos Unless Windows Are Open. The living room remains a work in progress, with dust sheets on the sofa and part of the main wall painted white.
‘You’re welcome,’ I reply, and stuff my hands in my pockets to stop them sweating. Although Hugo and I have been chatting easily by text, it feels more awkward in real life. I find myself second-guessing what to say, and I’m acutely aware I’m wearing my lounge clothes. I must look uncomfortable because he jiggles the plastic bag in his hand, like someone about to give a toddler a treat. ‘Would you like some crisps?’
‘What kind?’
‘“What kind?” she asks,’ he says, pulling out a bag of Nik Naks Nice and Spicy. The gesture is small, yet so enormously kind and thoughtful it makes me start crying all over again.
‘Why don’t we go for a walk?’ he says, handing me a box of tissues.
*
I’d been taking regular walks to explore the coastline further east, but my limited navigational skills meant I had stuck nervously to the straightest and flattest tracks. Hugo offers to take me to an old spot he loved visiting as a boy.
‘Is it the White Sentinels?’ I ask.
‘No,’ he says. ‘That’s a longer walk and you need to be careful with the tides. We can go there another time maybe. It might rain this afternoon.’
We head off in what seems like the wrong direction through the woodland, until Hugo points to a worn stone marker wrapped in moss and we take a sharp right that takes us back towards the sea.
From a higher vantage point, we see a sequence of small coves, their basins lit to turquoise by the remnants of the sun, gold-daubed at the waterline where sea meets sand. The nearest cove has a small beach with steps cut into the rock leading down to it.
‘Come on,’ says Hugo, taking off his beige and navy boaters and socks and heading in the direction of a series of flat rocks with pools of water in between, fronds of seaweed skimming the surface.
I roll up my jogging bottoms but the elastic is so loose, they threaten to shoot down at any moment.
The water in the rock pools is very clear and cold. I wonder what we look like to the creatures in the murk: a tall white man wearing a blue shirt and long shorts, and a round brown woman in a loose half-sleeved T-shirt with a frayed collar. Hugo doesn’t remark on it, doesn’t make a mean comment asking why I’m wearing men’s clothes. I should have worn the striped top I bought from the charity shop, but it would have looked strange if I’d changed, as if I was making a special effort.
‘Be careful,’ he says. ‘Technically we should be wearing shoes with a grip sole so we don’t slip on the algae.’
‘Er, what are we looking at?’ I say, because all I can see are jagged pieces of dark brown rock, turning silver in the places where the water pulls in the sky.
‘What are we looking at?’ he says, mock-offended. ‘Only an entire world caught between rock and water.’ For a flickering moment I see a young Hugo, hopping between dry bits of rock and peering into a different realm. ‘Look here!’
He bends down at the edge to a pool and talks to me about anemones and starfish, then asks if I knew there were seven types of crab? He picks up a strand of seaweed and holds it against the light, thick brown strands with a lightning bolt of yellow running through the centre, pearls of water shaking off and running down his tanned arm. ‘And look at this guy,’ he says, pointing at a small hermit crab. ‘I used to think this was me,’ he laughs. ‘Just someone looking for a home, any home. I would draw them all the time.’
I look at Hugo as he peers at the water. The expression of delight on his face makes something shift in my understanding of him. He isn’t a rich oaf who stumbles around taking things without asking; he’s an inquisitive nerd who shows the same passion for sea urchins that others do for Ferraris.
‘What’s the name of this beach?’ I ask.
‘It doesn’t have one,’ he says, continuing his search.
‘What if I name it Alva Beach?’ I say mischievously.
‘Oh, colonising the local beach in your name, are we?’ he laughs. After a while, I leave him to it and wade into the water up to my shins. Eventually he joins me. Even the smallest movement of our legs pushes ripples out into the still, calm surface, fragments gleaming where they catch the light.
‘So,’ he asks. ‘Do you want to talk about it? Why you were crying?’
‘Not really.’ My initial relief on seeing him has been replaced with excruciating embarrassment. I shrink from the memory of him seeing me cry. The line between air and water is all that tethers me to this point. I feel unmoored from everything else, and if that line breaks, I could slide between the cracks in the earth. Hugo is offering himself as an anchor. Maybe I should accept.
‘Is it one thing in particular or everything?’ he says.
‘Everything,’ I say morosely. ‘I have no job. My relationship is falling apart. And I feel like I am messing up with Myra. I just don’t know how to make her happy.’
Hugo stares ahead, and for a moment I am certain he is going to say something like, ‘Well, try not to feel that way,’ or make a joke, or go for the silent shoulder squeeze.
‘That’s not your job though, is it? To make her happy? I mean, that’s no one’s job. Taking that on for another person is a lot. Believe me, I know.’
I close my eyes and for a moment I’m not Padma, I’m just light and thought. The sound of splashing breaks through as Hugo wades out to sit on some driftwood. I follow and pat my legs dry.
‘My ex, Elaine,’ he says. ‘She – we – had a miscarriage and afterwards, I tried to do everything to make it better for her. I removed every obstacle, made her choices easy and soft, but it wasn’t enough. I couldn’t make her happy, I couldn’t be the reason for her happiness.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, and stay quiet. I always feel guilty when I hear about people who have lost children, given my choice not to have them. When I tell Hugo this, he says: ‘What do you have to feel guilty about? It’s your choice. It’s like feeling guilty if you want to break up with someone because you know someone whose partner died. People talk about having kids as if it’s a given, a duty. And maybe that used to be true but it certainly isn’t now.’
‘Try telling that to my boyfriend,’ I say glumly. When Hugo looks at me enquiringly, I give him a summary of what happened, and where Wallace and I are at. He frowns and brushes grains of sand off his feet. ‘What?’ I ask. He clearly has something to say.
‘It just seems like an odd tactic for him to use,’ he says. ‘I mean, I get why you’re struggling to tell him your choice, but it also seems like he’s not behaving in a way that would encourage you to make the choice he wants you to make. Is he punishing you? I don’t get it.’
‘He’s not a bad person,’ I say quickly. ‘He really wants to be a dad. That’s a good quality – it means he’s caring.’ Hugo doesn’t respond. I think treacherously that Wallace hasn’t exactly been particularly caring over the last couple of years. He talks about how stressful his work is, and how tired he is, but he has stopped asking me how I am. While I will bend to his needs – cook him a nice dinner if he’s had a long day – when I’ve been stressed out, there isn’t much thought or care shown beyond pouring me a glass of wine from a bottle he’s already opened for himself.
‘Do you think you might say yes, then?’ he says.
I shake my head. ‘There’s no question of that. I’ve seen what happens to people who try and fill their own void with children, or use them as a form of validation.’ Vocalising it to Hugo makes me realise I need to talk to Wallace about this soon rather than dragging this out to the end of the summer.
My phone buzzes with a message from Myra. Where are you? I have a surprise for you.
I have a surprise for you too, I text back.
‘It’s Myra,’ I say.
‘Let’s head back. I can buy the little ratbag an ice cream before I drive home.’
