The Dr Pepper Prophecies (25 page)

'This is Patr…' starts the familiar voice.

I snatch up the receiver.

'Patrick?' I say. 'Hi, it’s Mel.'

'Obviously you really didn’t feel like answering,' he says.

The message is stupid, but accurate.

'Have you talked to Beth?' he asks.

Well, not exactly.

In fact, not at all.  Except for her mentioning that she didn’t want to go out with him.

'Uh-huh,' I say brightly. 'I think she’s coming round to the idea.'

Liar, liar, pants on fire, the little voices say.

Little voices should be seen and not heard.

No, that doesn’t quite work, does it?

'Wonderful,' Patrick says cheerfully. 'Should I call back and speak to her?'

Well, she might speak to him.  Or she might hang up and try to strangle me with the telephone cord.

Stranger things have happened.

'She’s working really late for a few days,' I lie, clutching the telephone cord as if Beth may be able to strangle me with it via telekinesis. 'But I know she’s free Friday night.  You could just leave the details with me and I’ll pass them onto her.  It’ll be pretty hard to get hold of her otherwise.  She never takes personal calls at work and she doesn’t have a mobile.'

That part’s true at least.

'If you think that would be best,' Patrick says amiably.

He’s so trusting.  What a wonderful quality in a man.

'I know a charming little place with excellent service that I think she’d love,' Patrick continues cheerfully. 'Sort of a gathering place for my circle, as it were.  Do you think Beth would mind getting in with my set for the evening?'

Even better.

'I’m positive that she’d love it,' I say, genuinely pleased. 'Beth doesn’t have a circle.  In fact, she doesn’t even really have a line.  It would be great for her to meet some new people, especially the kind she went to school with.  She doesn't seem to be in touch with anyone from her old home except her mother.'

'Excellent,' Patrick say
s. 'The place is called La Tempête.  I’ll give you the address.  Shouldn’t be too hard to find.  Very popular place, trés connue.'

I grab the phone pad and pen and scribble down the address.  I’m pretty sure that I spelt the name of the place wrong.  Five years of French and I can’t even remember how to say hello, let alone ‘Where can I buy some Belgian chocolates?’
.  Still, I’m sure Beth can figure it out.  I think she actually speaks French properly, little lines in the right places above the words and everything.

'That’s great,' I say, crossing my fingers. 'She’ll see you there.'

'Cheers,' Patrick says, and hangs up.

The little voices have created bodies for themselves like those little aliens in
Toy Story
.  They’re standing in a row, staring disapprovingly at me.

What
?  So I bent the truth a little.  Matt was right, it is hard to find a decent guy.  And she can make some new friends too.  She must miss hanging out with other people who played croquet and walked around with books on their head at school.

I mean, one date.  What’s the…?

See, I caught myself that time.  No jinx.

It’ll go great.

**
 

My mission, which I have chosen to accept, is to get Beth to meet Patrick by any means necessary.  It’s delayed somewhat, however, by the atrocious smell that accompanies Beth back into the flat.

I hold my nose.  I can’t help it.

'What’s that?' I ask, in the stupid buzzing voice that results from this.

Beth glances at a dark patch on her sweatshirt. 'Baby sick,' she says matter-of-factly.

And here I was thinking someone throwing up on you was something to get upset about.

'It smells disgusting,' I say, releasing my nose all the same. 'Anyway, why are there babies at the library?  They can’t read.'

'Because they have big brothers and sisters who can,' Beth answers. 'I had to hold one while the mother sorted out his big brother’s accident.'

'Accident?' I ask, then realise and pull a face. 'Forget I asked.'

Sometimes, motherhood just sounds gross.

'I’ll just go rinse this off and change,' Beth says, pulling her sweatshirt over her head as she heads off to her bedroom.

I open my third can of
cola and settle down at the table.

Okay, what is the plan?

Answer, don’t have one.

Think.

Well…if I tell her she’ll be seeing Patrick, she won’t go.  Nerves, obviously.

So I need to make her think she’s meeting someone else.  Someone she trusts.

Which narrows it down to…me.  And Will.

And I’m not going to pretend to her that she’s meeting Will.

So, me.

The beginnings of a plan.

Except that…she lives with me.  Why would she go out to meet me?

Hmmm.

'One of the perks of the job,' Beth says, coming back in wearing a clean sweatshirt.

She can’t have got back so fast.  I’m not ready!

'Beth,' I say, figuring that it’s now or never, 'I’ve been thinking.'

Beth heads into the kitchen and pulls the dish of lasagne out of the fridge.

'What about?' she asks, as she starts levering a couple of slices out and onto a plate.

Good question, to which I have no immediate answer.

I have to say something.

I’ve been thinking about…

'About all the disastrous dates I set you up on,' I say, the clichéd light-bulb lighting up above my head.

Beth puts the plate in the microwave and goes back to the fridge for the bowl of salad she made earlier. 'Forget about them,' she says charitably. 'They were rather funny really.  Something I could tell my grandchildren perhaps.'
She pauses. 'When they’re old enough, anyway.'

'I can’t,' I say, adopting a more subdued tone on the off chance that it’ll help my case. 'I feel bad about them and I wanted to make it up to you.  I heard about this really nice place in town.  I thought we could get dressed up and go, just the two of us.  A real girly night out.  We could even bring home a couple of waiters.'

Beth laughs as she starts serving up dinner. 'I don’t know about that last part,' she says. 'But otherwise, fine.'

'I thought you’d say that,' I begin, 'but…'

I pause.  I run her response through my head once again.

'Really?' I ask, amazed. 'I thought you’d try to get out of it.  I mean, you never go anywhere except work.  Apart from that weekend at your…'

I break off. 'Beth?' I say curiously. 'Where did you go that weekend you were away?'

'I went to my mother’s,' Beth says, normally enough, but there’s a touch of a pink hue to the skin on her neck.

She brings over our plates to the table I’ve already set and sits down opposite me.

'No, really,' I press her. 'I know you didn’t go to see her, because she called Friday night after you left.  And don’t even think about telling me she’s got amnesia or some soap opera excuse like that.  Where did you really go?'

Beth pauses, fork in hand. 'You’re right,' she admits. 'I wasn’t at my mother’s.'

And then she starts calmly eating her lasagne.

I watch her for a few minutes.  Not eating, even with the gorgeous smell of my dinner tempting me to abandon all conversation.

'You’re not going to tell me where you were, are you?' I say finally, when my stomach demands immediate clarification of the position.

'No,' Beth says, kindly but firmly, 'I’m not.' She pauses. 'At least, not yet.'

And I thought waiting for results day was bad.

I can’t believe she’s not going to tell me.

**
 

A full thirty-six hours later, Beth still hasn’t told me.  I’ve told Patrick that Beth will be there tomorrow and I’ve nearly called home six times.  Cynthia is still on vacation, Matt is obviously giving me ‘space’, I’d swear Julie was avoiding me if I could think of any reason why she would be doing that and Martin has taken to popping by for ‘spot-checks’.  Otherwise known as those surprise inspections they used to do at guide camp.  He’s dying to give me another verbal warning but, unfortunately for him, having no friends means I’m getting stacks of work done.  I’m beginning to wish I was paid by
the piece.

It’s a sad day
really, when you realise you have nothing better to do at work than work.

I sit there, doing an imp
ressively efficient job of data-inputting, not even misspelling Mr Focker’s name as I usually would, when I become aware of someone watching me.

Usually when I feel like this, Martin is watching me.  I steel myself for a ‘nice little quiz’ on underwriters (the people who word your insurance policy so precisely that you end up not being able to claim for
anything) and office procedures and look up.

It isn’t Martin.  It’s my mother.

There is a distinct possibility that I may be hallucinating.

A couple of stressed negotiators head for the filing cabinets, staring at her as they go past, which knocks that idea on the head.

It’s as if someone has cut her out of a magazine and pasted her onto the background of my office.  In her could-never-be-fashionable blue dress and cream cardigan, her hair all pinned back, she fits in like a pigeon amongst bats.  It’s bizarre, almost surreal, that she’s actually here.

She approaches me, clutching her skirt.  She’s nervous, I realise.  My own mother is nervous about speaking to me.

'Hello, darling,' she says awkwardly, when she reaches my desk. 'I just thought I’d pop in to visit you.'

My parents
don’t have a car anymore.  My dad refused even to let my mother learn to drive.  Just popping in requires a two-hour bus trip.

'I suppose you’re very busy,' she says, looking at the pile of claim forms on my desk.

'I do have a lot to do,' I say awkwardly. 'But I’d love a reason not to do it.'

The ice doesn’t quite break, but it melts a little.  Mum smiles weakly.

'We could go to the staff room,' I suggest.  I check my watch.  It’s eleven-thirty.  Diet Coke Break. 'There shouldn’t be anyone in there at this time.'

Mum nods in acquiescence, disturbingly in the same way as she does to my Dad, and follows me without further comment as I get up and lead the way.

She has a good look round the staffroom while I busy myself making coffee, a rather pained expression on her face.  It's certainly not an inviting place.  They spent thousands on a fancy conference room and pennies on this.  The furniture is battered and stained and everything is in some shade of grey.  There may even be fifty.

I bring two mugs of coffee over and we sit together.  'I’m sorry I didn’t call back,' I say, before the ice between us has a chance to
re-harden. 'I knew Dad would probably answer.  And I didn't know what to say.'

My mother has her hands folded neatly in her lap and she’s sitting up perfectly straight, the way she would always softly encourage me and Brittany to do when we were young.  The way we always didn’t.  I find myself trying to force my now-lazy spine to copy hers.

'I don’t think that there’s anything you need to say to us,' Mum says, in her low, soft voice. 'I think that there are things we…or I, at least…should say to you.'

Typical that it's Mum trying to fix things.

'You don’t have to…' I try to say.

Mum shakes her head. 'There are things that I want you to know.'

She takes a deep breath. 'When I was young,' she begins, slowly and carefully, 'I was taught that my future was not something I should worry about.  I should go to school until I could leave, work in an office and then marry the first suitable man who made me an offer.  All of which I did.'

She pauses.  Her eyes look almost sad. 'I am now forty-five years old,' she continues, h
er voice wavering a tiny bit, 'and I have been nothing in my life but a wife and mother.  I love my family, but now you're grown and there is really little for me to do with my time.'

'You have choices I would never have dreamed of when I was a girl.  Brittany has made my choices again.  I think that your father and I have discouraged you both from adventuring.  Your father intentionally, me by accident.'

She squeezes my hand. 'I expected you to marry Alan Marshall,' she says, 'although I never truly liked him.  When you applied for university, I believed you would change your mind.  But you didn’t. You have made your own decisions and taken risks I would never have had the courage to take.  And for that, and countless other things, I’m very proud to call you my daughter.'

I feel suddenly lighter.  Like I did on the Duke of Edinburgh Award expedition when I finally took my backpack off.  I’m not a total failure.  I have done something with my life.