Diary of a Provincial Lesbian (3 page)

‘My old mum’s a jewel, Tom says. ‘I’d be devastated if anything happened to her.’

‘Me too,’ says Miriam who I’ve obviously completely misunderstood. I push aside
Coffee Ice Magnifico
and stand up. Say, ‘Better see about Georgie’s tea.’

‘Georgie?’ Tom queries. ‘Your fellah? Your better half?’

‘My partner.’

Leave. As I pass the
Coffee Shop’s
window I see that Tom has commandeered my
Magnific
o and is talking to Miriam. Cannot see Miriam’s face.

Jan 27
^th

Central heating radiator in guest bedroom not working so get Georgie to bring early model, electric fan heater down from loft. This causes much swearing and ill natured thumping as fan heater, a relic from Georgie’s bedsit days, has hidden itself away in the twenty-fourth of twenty-four cardboard boxes.

Downstairs in kitchen I prepare my four cheese lasagne, which invariably results in dinner guest later experiencing either horrific or erotic nightmares. Adorn table with leftover Christmas crackers, Christmas paper serviettes, Christmas red and gold candles.

‘Ridiculous,’ Georgie says on her way through to the sitting room. ‘It looks as if you’ve got Cardinal Wolsey coming to dinner. I need a drink.’

‘Of course you do,’ I say soothingly. Pour both of us double strength gin and tonics with moon and star shaped ice cubes. Carry them into sitting room. In doorway regret non removal of Marigold gloves.

‘Cheers,’ I shout gaily.

‘Cheers,’ she mutters grimly. Takes mouthful then looks suspiciously at glass, ‘Go easy on the gin next time.’

Work out that Tabby’s train was due in ten minutes ago which means her taxi should be arriving at any moment. Take off apron, rubber gloves; switch on porch light, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Don’t personally care for the classics but every birthday am bought a classical CD by Georgie’s parents. This my own fault as on first introduction I’d enthused over their extensive collection and said that my one ambition was to turn the back bedroom into a classical music library.

Take Georgie in a refill, have one for myself. Light candles. Set Four Seasons back to the beginning. Georgie appears in kitchen doorway looking more relaxed. ‘You are a fraud,’ she says. ‘You just want to impress this woman.’

‘Well why not?’

We have one of those rare split seconds of total communion and then the phone rings. It is Tabby saying there are no taxis at the station, it is pitch black and she’s being watched by several sinister looking men. I say, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll collect you. Be there in five minutes.’

Georgie stares at me with stunned annoyance.

‘Margaret I can’t possibly drive, I’m well over the limit.’

‘I’ll drive.’

‘You’re well over the limit.’

‘It wouldn’t matter if I lose my license - I hardly use the car.’

‘I’ll bloody drive.’

In silence we drive to the station. From the tense line of Georgie’s jaw I can tell she’s absolutely furious. We pull into the station forecourt; pass a line of four waiting taxis. Immediately recognise Tabby, her sergeant major posture hasn’t changed at all. The six metal buttons of her double breasted military style winter coat look as if they’d been regularly spit and polished. Know then that I am mad to have invited her. A door in my memory has swung open. I’m remembering the young Tabby, remembering that I didn’t like her, remembering that nobody liked her apart from another girl called Nina, who nobody liked either.

I hurry forwards. Kiss her cheek. She rears back as if I’ve made a pass at her. ‘Have you been drinking?’ are her first words of greeting.

‘Only a small g & t. We didn’t expect to be driving this evening.’

‘I don’t know whether I should let myself get in a car with the two of you in this state.’ We stand silently. ‘Oh very well. I expect taxis down here don’t come cheap.’

She marches ahead of me towards the car. Gets in next to Georgie. I slip into the back seat.

Tabby’s visit abominable. Appeared insulted by crackers, picked at lasagne while clasping her stomach with spare hand, drank only tap water, disliked central heating, also fan heaters. Said fan heaters were death traps. Introduced her to Samson, Delilah and Tilly in certain knowledge that pets can often be excellent bonding agents.

‘Do you have any pets?’ I ask.

‘I prefer people,’ Tabby replies grimly.

From nervousness I squeak, ‘As pets?’

Later when Georgie has retired to bed with trumped up migraine Tabby says, ‘That was a nasty trick, dumping Ronald for his sister. There was nothing wrong with Ronald. I wouldn’t have said “no” to Ronald.’

‘As I mentioned in my email I fell in love with his sister.’

‘Well where is she?’

‘As I mentioned in my email I’m now with Georgie.’

‘First you fall in love with Ronald, then his sister, now Georgie, who’s next? You were like that at school - no staying power. We always had to bring in a substitute for the second half of a hockey match.’

Show Tabby to her room. Offer her a choice of novels.

‘I don’t think so,’ she says with a shudder as if I’ve offered her pornography instead of an Anita Brookner, a Margaret Drabble, and a Pat Barker. Marches into guest room saying, ‘Now for a start we’ll have this off,’ and unplugs the fan heater. Shuts bedroom door firmly in my face.

Would like to discuss the Tabby phenomenon with Georgie but she is feigning deep and satisfying sleep. Query: why did Tabby agree to stay if she so disliked and disapproved of me? Tossed and turned for some time. It’s not pleasant to be disliked and disapproved of in one’s own house by guests. Not what one expects.

Finally Georgie switches side lamp on and sits up.

‘I know what you’re fretting about but listen and then go to sleep. Your mate Tabby will be just as dreadful to her friend, Nina, tomorrow. She can’t help being dreadful. It’s her nature and not anything personal about you. Ok?’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because I just do know. You act. I think. Sometimes that works in your favour, this time it didn’t. Now can we get some shut-eye?’

We settle down, Georgie lying on her back, me tucked under her arm, my head resting on her shoulder, ‘Sorry about Tabby.’ I whisper.

‘We’ll laugh about this tomorrow.’

With relief we waved Tabby off to the station in a taxi the next afternoon and then we did laugh.

February

Feb 1st

A word about the Bittlesea Bay Café which is one of my favourite places. It looks out over green hills dotted with patches of gorse that by mid-March become vivid splashes of yellow - also out over the seafront and the sea. There’s a terrace balcony where we sit when the weather’s ok, the home-made cakes are delicious, gateaux divided into generous wedges, huge cream teas from Easter Bank Holiday onwards. A nice touch is the large metal water bowls left out for all visiting dogs. Dogs are allowed in the café provided they stick to the smoking area.

Georgie says it’s not very clean which I dispute. She has a habit of running her hand across unfamiliar table tops and sometimes being unpleasantly surprised by what adheres. No matter, I love it. Deirdre loves it. She says ‘Unbeatable’, smacking her lips as if the café’s a mouth-watering plate of food. ‘Where else could you find such a view?’

Which is very loyal of her as she’s travelled to India, Australia, Greece, Holland, Italy, Canada and Cornwall and must have found an equally fabulous view in at least one of those exotic places!

This afternoon, by the time I arrive, Deirdre is already ensconced. As always she looks almost larger than life, wearing a cream and pale pink patterned trouser suit, her stylish raffia handbag colour matched to ensemble by way of attached cream and pink silk roses. Also pink scarf, pink lipstick and pink cheeks. Outside its six degrees centigrade, inside and Deirdre’s dressed for a summer wedding.

‘I’ll be Mum,’ she says as I strip off my fleece, woollen waistcoat, hat, scarf, gloves.

Cheerfully we remark on how this is the first time that the metal tea pot has poured without soaking the tablecloth, however the metal milk jug more than makes up for this and we mop up the mess with two paper serviettes.

‘Wow! Is this fantastic or is this fantastic?!’ exclaims Deidre taking in the view of anoraked dog walkers battling against the wind. Her gaze pans back to my carrier bags, ‘Been shopping?’

‘Just the Hospice shop.’

She leans forward and says sotto voce, ‘Would they have any really old, antique fabrics in a place like that? You know, the sort of stuff that’s worth a fortune but the old dears that run the place haven’t got a clue.’

Deirdre, as a successful designer with accounts at Debenham’s and John Lewis, has never been near a charity shop. She did once come with me to a boot fair out in the countryside, again in the hope of purchasing quantities of antique fabric, and was appalled at what she saw as the poverty of stalls and stall holders.

‘Eeuw?’ she’d squealed standing on the edge of the field and looking shocked. ‘So depressing.’

I looked across the table into her eager face, ‘I don’t think so.’

‘What about knitwear? Really old pure wool, cashmere, textural weaves? Texture. Quality antique texture - that’s what I’m after.’

Severely I say, ‘Deirdre this is a poor area. Who’d have cashmere and antique textural weaves to send to charity shops?’

‘Rich old biddies fallen on hard times.’

‘Now that’s enough.’

‘But just suppose there was something like that, what sort of money are we talking?’

‘Two pounds fifty upwards.’

Deirdre sits sharply back in her chair, ‘That much? I’d have thought they’d be asking twenty pence an article, fifty pence max.’

‘You’d have thought wrong. They have to make a profit.’

‘I don’t see why charities should be making profits out of other people.’

I sigh. Deirdre and I don’t always understand each other. We live in very different worlds with some overlap which finds us meeting up at least once a week and in between discussing life and its variables on the telephone.

‘How’s Martin?’ I ask to change the subject.

Apart from the odd occasion when Martin regales us with his humorous Mussolini anecdotes he is a semi-recluse. As a rule he comes out after dark usually when everyone else is going to bed. If spotted by me unexpectedly during daylight hours he holds up his hand to shield his face as if I am a member of the paparazzi and have been camped outside his house for several weeks to get that one shot of Martin making for his car.

‘I have no idea,’ she says stiffly. ‘Can we change the subject?’

We move on to the subject of where ice-cream vans go in winter.

Feb 3
^rd

Receive email from Tabby thanking us for a lovely evening and offering to put us up if we are ever passing through Daventry, although she’ll warn us now that she only has a studio flat so we’d have to bring sleeping bags and sleep on the kitchen floor. Nina sends her best wishes.

 Feb 6th

Re. Hospice Shop, by strange coincidence, Deirdre is not the only person interested in it. This morning as I passed on the way to work, as per usual I peered in (to snaffle bargains one must be vigilant). Shop doesn’t open till 10am. but there’s generally some member of staff milling around inside sorting through the bags of stuff left on the door step during the night. Today was not unusual, a member of staff milled and that member of staff was Miriam!

‘That can’t be Miriam,’ I said to myself knowing full well that it was.

She saw me peering, grinned rather self-consciously, then mouthed ‘We’re closed’ and directed me to the ‘CLOSED’ sign on the door. Mouthed back, ‘I’m well aware of that. See you later.’

Found myself in bad temper and envious state. Considered the Hospice Shop very much my own personal terrain. Had bought many almost fashionable items there, taken them home - washed, fabric conditioned, ironed, mended, shortened, lengthened and added to. I may not have Deirdre’s fashionista style or Georgie’s cosmopolitan casual but I’d managed pretty well so far. Often Miriam had said over something refurbished during the weekend, ‘That’s new. It really suits you.’

And I’d smiled demurely, (which I appreciate is not a pleasant or genuine way to smile) and said a simple, ‘Thank you. Er...London,’ or ‘Present from Georgie - she knows what I like.’

Now I was scuppered. In the future, Miriam would recognise my purchases. I’d shop in fear that one day I’d find her lurking behind the Hospice sales desk instead of her rightful afternoon place behind her desk at TM Accountancy.
‘Good heavens Margaret, do I see something off the “Every Item £1” rail in your hand?’

And she would get first pick of the bargains. The twice worn tweed jacket, the Gap
jeans that someone had grown out of, almost new men’s shirts, the hooded fleeces. Mentally I ticked my wardrobe off in my head. That was it. All over for me. By the time I’d reached work I’d built up quite a Miriam antagonism.

‘What a face,’ Tom Matthews said.

One o’clock on the dot Miriam came in carrying two sacks of clothing. Did not wish to speak to her - ever again. Drops bags behind her desk, takes cigarettes and lighter from her rucksack, says, ‘Aren’t you coming for my ciggy break - it’s stopped raining?’

I humph and sigh. Take out wrapped sandwich which suddenly seems a despicable, measly sandwich and why don’t I buy grander sandwich from Marks & Spencer instead of always this insipid, handmade apology?

Stand on step. Say, ‘Actually it hasn’t stopped raining.’

Miriam shrugs. ‘Nothing to speak of. I suppose you’re wondering what I was doing in the Hospice Shop.’

I feign surprise, ‘Not at all.’

‘Well, what else can I do, Margaret?’ Her voice is dismal. She puffs grey smoke up at the grey sky. My animosity is momentarily stopped in its tracks.