Divas Don't Knit (6 page)

‘So we’ll expect you on Sunday afternoon, then, around teatime?’

‘Don’t be like that. I’m going to be firm this time.’

‘Right.’

‘I am. Cool and calm and in control.’

‘Okey-dokey.’

‘But if the cool thing doesn’t work, will Saturday afternoon be all right?’

‘Of course. Vin might be around, too.’

‘Oh, good. Has he stopped doing his Jacques Cousteau thing then?’

Vin’s a marine biologist, and tends to be off counting plankton when he’s not surfing and lounging about with the kind of blonde girlfriends who look good in wetsuits.

‘No, but he’s back while they de-barnacle the boat or something, so he’s coming down to stay and help me sort
the house out. I was thinking we might start this weekend by painting everything white.’

‘Less of the “we”, darling, if you don’t mind. You can do the DIY and I’ll do cocktails.’

‘Yes, but not those pink zombie things like you did last time. I can’t move after one of those, let alone paint ceilings.’

‘That’s because they’re mostly vodka, darling. I’ll do you a PG version. More pink, less zombie.’

‘Perfect.’

By the time I’m in bed it’s nearly one, and I’ve gone right past the totally knackered stage and straight into staring into the darkness. I can’t find my sodding duvet, or any sheets, and I’m too exhausted to look in any more bloody crates so I’m shivering under a motley selection of Archie’s old cot blankets, and Jack’s old duvet cover with the purple stains from a sugar-free-Ribena incident, lying listening to the sea and trying to convince myself that it’s lovely and soothing, and a far superior background noise to the London traffic I’m used to, but it’s not bloody working. The sound of the waves crashing on the rocks down by the pier seems to be getting louder, and I’m getting colder by the minute. Christ. If it’s going to be like this every night I’ll have to buy earplugs. I think I’m having a slow-motion panic attack, wondering if I’ve done the right thing moving us down here, and whether the house will fall down before I’ve had a chance to get rid of that horrible wallpaper in the hall, when I’m suddenly inspired to make a List. Making Lists always makes you feel like you’re in control, so it’s a Top Plan.

Right. Number one, buy gallons of matt emulsion, and rent a sander. Two, get a new hammer because the old one’s got a dodgy handle, and three, find my bloody duvet. And finish Jack’s blanket and sort out a new window display for the shop. Something that doesn’t look like someone’s just chucked a few balls of wool in and then gone home, maybe with a seaside theme, with buckets and spades and shells. I could hang some
net up and knit some fish shapes. I’d probably need twenty or thirty, in cotton, maybe, oranges and blues, and maybe some silver ones, too, and I could knit some seaweed in dark green, in chenille or something velvety. Actually I think I may need to be Getting a Grip now, because I’m lying here obsessing about knitting seaweed and it isn’t really helping.

‘Mum, I had a horrible dream and the sea came right in the house and we were all drownded. I hate this house. I want to go back to London.’

Jack’s standing in the doorway, looking pitiful.

‘It was just a dream, darling. Come and snuggle in and you’ll be fine. Go and get your duvet, but be very quiet so you don’t wake Archie.’

‘I’m already waked up.’

Excellent. Archie’s dragging his duvet along the floor behind him; no need to hoover the upstairs landing for a while then.

‘Snuggle up now, it’s very late.’

‘Can we have a story?’

‘No.’

Two small wriggling boys, and a corner of a child-sized duvet. I’ll be asleep in no time.

Gran appears at half past seven the next morning, with a packet of bacon and a new loaf, looking full of energy. God, I really hope she’s not planning on doing this every morning. I’d forgotten about her early starts: the only drawback to spending the summer holidays at Gran’s was being hoiked out of bed at the crack of dawn every day. Vin used to refuse to get up, but I never had the nerve, and this morning’s no exception. I’m downstairs putting the kettle on before I’m even half awake while she starts cooking the bacon and humming Onward, Christian Soldiers.

‘You sit yourself down and let me do that. You looked completely done in last night, you know. Did you sleep well?’

‘Yes, fine, thanks.’

Actually this is surprisingly true, despite dreaming about being shipwrecked and getting tangled up in seaweed and having to cut myself free with the breadknife before I could swim to shore. At least it was better than the one where I’m driving the car on the motorway with the boys in the back and the steering wheel comes off in my hand.

‘One egg or two?’

‘Just bacon for me, thanks, Gran.’

‘You can’t have just bacon, that’s not a proper breakfast if you’ve got a busy day in front of you. I’ll do you one. Go to work on an egg, isn’t that what they say?’

Not for the last thirty years they haven’t, but never mind. ‘I’m fine with a bacon sandwich, honestly.’

She sniffs, which means she doesn’t approve but doesn’t want to make a scene. ‘Shall I do the boys scrambled eggs, then?’

‘Lovely.’

Her chances of getting either of them to eat scrambled egg are almost zero but it’s the thought that counts, and at least it’ll stop her obsessing about what I’m eating.

They come downstairs and start running round the table, clapping their hands and shouting ‘Bacon, bacon’ and seem thrilled to find someone is finally providing them with a proper cooked breakfast.

Gran starts to crack the eggs into a bowl.

‘What’s the plan for today? Only I said I’d pop in to see Betty later, and I’ve got the bowls club this afternoon, and bingo tonight, for the lifeboats.’

‘I thought I’d do some more crates and then I want to go into the shop and see if the new stock’s in yet.’

‘Right you are then, lovey.’

I’m really looking forward to seeing the new stock: I’ve met
most of the reps over the past few months, and they’ve shown me their new autumn ranges and told me about discounts and bulk orders, and in-store promotion kits, most of which were either too big to fit in the shop or required ordering vast quantities of the new ranges that I didn’t particularly like, but the Rowan rep turned up with all sorts of gorgeous samples in beautiful colours and I got carried away, to the tune of a small fortune in anybody’s money. Particularly mine. Which I’m trying not to think about.

‘They’ve asked me to be ladies’ captain you know.’

‘Who have, Gran?’

‘The Bowls Club. It’s a lot of work, mind, arranging all the matches and everything, but I think I’ll do it, now I’ve got the time. Only you’re to say, you know, if you need me to help out in the shop or anything. I don’t want you getting exhausted – these two are enough to keep anyone busy.’

She gives me a sideways look as she stirs the eggs.

‘Yes, but they’ll be back at school soon, and then I’ll have every day until three, and Elsie says she’ll do the afternoons and extra in the holidays, so it’s only Saturday mornings really, if that’s still OK with you?’

‘Of course it is, pet.’

Archie’s stopped running round the table and is giving me one of his Determined looks, which usually means trouble.

‘I’m not going to school. I’m staying here, to play with the dog.’

Great. I can go to prison for failing to get my five-year-old to be a regular attender, and the RSPCA can take the dog into care.

‘Don’t be silly, Archie. They’ve got lovely things in your classroom, paints and a sand tray, don’t you remember? And we’re not getting a dog.’

‘Yes, but you have to sit on the mat at school. You always have to sit on the stupid mat.’

‘But only for stories, and you love stories.’

‘I can have my stories at home with you.’

‘I’ll be working in the shop, so you’ll have to come with me and sit and be very quiet. But if you’re sure you want to be at home like a baby when Jack goes off to school, I suppose we could do that; I’m surprised, though, now you’re such a big boy.’

‘Well, I might go, just to see what it’s like, only I haven’t decided yet.’

I pour myself a cup of tea, and there’s a marked silence when Gran presents the boys with their bacon and scrambled eggs.

‘I don’t like jumbled-up eggs.’

‘Yes, you do, Jack. Your mum used to love them scrambled when she was your age. Just you eat up like a good boy and then we can go down to the beach.’

Jack stares at his plate, while Archie starts eating with extra lip-smacking sound effects.

‘Can we take our fishing nets? Because we might catch a big fish, there might be a whale, and we could keep it in the bath.’

Jack rolls his eyes. ‘You couldn’t get it in your net, silly, a great big whale, the pole would snap.’

‘It might want to be friends, and it could swim up by itself. You don’t know.’

‘Tell him, Mum.’

‘You can both take your nets if we can find them, and your buckets, and we can go fishing for crabs off the pier later, if you like, but you’ll have to eat your breakfast first, Jack. Try some of your egg, properly, and then if you don’t like it you can leave it. But it was my favourite when I was little, so try some.’

He takes a tentative forkful. I’m really hoping Gran isn’t going to launch into her waste-not, want-not routine, because it’s not going to work with Jack, who could be a major food fusser if he was given half a chance, so I pretty much go for the one mouthful and then if you don’t like it don’t eat it, but don’t whine approach, which has worked pretty well so far, apart from cauliflower and avocado.

‘Actually, it’s quite nice.’

Gran smiles. ‘There’s a good boy.’

He grins at me as Gran gets up to pour herself more tea.

I unpack more crates upstairs while the boys finish breakfast, and get thoroughly absorbed in arranging sheets and pillowcases in neat little piles in the big linen cupboard on the landing, which has slatted wooden shelves and smells faintly of mothballs. The house may be in chaos, and I still don’t know where half my clothes are but at least I’ve got an impeccable arrangement of sheets and towels. By the time we’re dressed Gran’s managed to unpack a vast collection of half-used tins of paint downstairs, so I stack them in the garage while Gran tries to get the boys to stop duelling with their fishing nets before someone gets poked in the eye. I’m starting to feel rather nervous about going into the shop now we’re actually down here and moved in, it all feels a bit like the first day of school after the holidays, only I haven’t had a holiday. And my back’s starting to hurt again so I’m doing a rather stiff-legged trudge as we head off down the hill, while Gran tells the boys how Vin and I used to sledge down it in the snow, and Vin once shot right across the road and nearly onto the beach.

I’m having visions of a Cresta Run of solid ice outside the shop and Archie disappearing under a bus balanced on my best teatray as we continue our royal progress down the high street, with Gran stopping to talk to practically everybody she meets, while the boys run ahead, and then run back again waving their fishing nets and trying to get her to hurry up. The shops haven’t changed much over the years; the butcher has the same plastic parsley among all the white china trays, and the pink china pig, and Parsons’ has still got metal buckets and mops hanging outside and smells of glue and wood shavings like it always did. We go in to say good morning to Mr Parsons and Archie knocks a coal scuttle over, and then we’re outside the florists next door to our shop, and Mrs Davis comes out to say hello carrying a plastic tub full of yellow roses.

Elsie’s waiting for us, standing behind the old-fashioned counter with the glass top when I push open the door, which sticks so you have to give it a bit of a shove; that’s another thing I must get sorted, because people are always half falling into the shop after shoving too hard. The bell jingles, and keeps on jingling as the boys each have a turn at opening and closing the door.

‘Aren’t you going to come and say hello to Aunty Elsie?’

They shuffle over, suddenly shy, while Gran casts an expert eye over the shelves and spots some of the new stock, a mohair and silk mix in bright acid colours which will knit up into lovely delicate wraps and shawls.

‘They look expensive.’

I can tell she’s not sure, and I don’t really blame her because Elsie’s bundled them all together in a complete clash of colours. She’s put the new cottons next to them, too, all shoved in together, right next to some acrylic baby wool in a revolting shade of sickly green. Next to salmon pink. Maybe she was just trying to be helpful, or maybe not, but I’m itching to move them.

Gran puts her bag on the counter.

‘I see you finished your cardi, Elsie.’

Elsie nods and gives us a twirl. Dear God, it’s got zigzag stripes, in every colour imaginable, and it makes her look like one of those Peruvian poncho people who play the pan pipes outside Tube stations wearing hats with ear flaps, mixed in with a hint of Missoni, if they’d suddenly gone colour blind and went in for double knitting. If you look at it for too long you start to feel dizzy.

‘I could knit you one, too, if you like, Jo, and we could wear them in the shop.’