What Women Want, Women of a Dangerous Age: 2-Book Collection. Fanny Blake
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husband and two children (she’d have had the point-four if she could have arranged it) in spick-and-span heaven outside Edinburgh. Bea resolved to bring up the subject of moving house again, but not right now. She didn’t want to spoil the afternoon ahead.
Tempted though she was to do the bit of washing-up piled by the sink, she ignored it, knowing that her mother would only take her help as a form of criticism. Instead she returned to the sitting room to put the fireguard in place before standing and staring out of the window at the long garden stretching towards the copse beyond. Just the sight of it brought back all those years of hide-and-seek, bonfires, camping. If only Ben could have enjoyed the place in the same way, but childhood was different these days. Nobody was thrown outside after lunch and told to ‘go and play’ for a couple of hours any more. She could imagine Ben’s reaction if she’d ever dared to try.
‘I’m ready.’ Adele came into the room, having put on a taupe cotton skirt with a neat white blouse, car keys in hand.
‘I’ll drive, Ma.’ Although Adele’s doctor seemed to think she was still capable, the idea of her mother driving scared the hell out of Bea. She wasn’t frightened for Adele but for everybody else on the road. ‘You can navigate.’
‘Where are we going again?’
‘The Hare and Hounds in Ludborough. If we get there early enough we’ll be able to sit outside.’
The lanes were almost empty as Bea drove, ignoring Adele’s uncertain directions and relying on the satnav. They arrived without mishap and pulled into the already busy car park alongside the pub. Above the porch, darkened windows winked out from behind the profusion of vivid pink and red petunias, yellow golden eye and trailing blue lobelia crammed into the window boxes. Mother and daughter picked their way through the dim lounge bar, ordering their drinks en route, and out into the back garden, blinking at the sudden light.
It was the best kind of English summer’s day – blue sky with puffs of cloud chased across it by a light wind. Sitting in the pub garden at a table in the shade of a whispering beech tree with a bowl of soup, a chunk of crusty bread and a glass of lager, the world seemed a better place. Inevitably, the conversation moved immediately to Bea’s own life. As usual, her mother could be relied upon to put her mind to good use when listening to Bea, helping her to get matters into some sort of perspective.
Although she was of the generation of middle-class wives whose pregnancy had put an end to their ambition and who had stayed at home to bring up their children, Adele was an intelligent woman, whose husband had trusted her good sense when he had had to make his own business decisions. She had known exactly how his bank functioned, who worked there and what they did or didn’t contribute and how he was able to manipulate them to his success. As a result, she had developed a pragmatic stance from which to view life. So, as far as she could see, whatever happened at Coldharbour, there was nothing Bea could do to influence events. If she wanted to keep her job, or until she had decided whether or not she did, she should put her head down and work hard, adopting the stance that Adam Palmer expected: tough, go-getting. When she’d won his confidence, she’d be in a position to make a choice. As for Ben, had Bea ever seen a monosyllabic twenty-two-year-old who spent all day in front of the TV? Of course not. The boy would grow out of it, just like all the others. Bea had a nasty feeling that there were plenty of twenty-two-year-olds who never had.
Later, as Adele was laughing at the story of her daughter’s latest dating fiasco, Bea’s phone rang.
‘Bea, it’s Kate. You’ll never guess.’
‘Well, for God’s sake tell me, then.’
‘It’s Ellen. She’s got herself a man!’
For a moment Bea was thrown. ‘Ellen? Hang on a minute.’ She held up one finger and gestured to her mother that she wouldn’t be long.
Adele nodded, quite content to watch what was going on at the tables around her while she waited for Bea to finish.
‘Yes, Ellen. Your old university friend who’s been single since her husband died. That Ellen.’ Bea could hear Kate’s excitement. ‘I went to the gallery this morning and she told me. He’s one of her customers!’
‘You have got to be joking. After all this time? Who is he? When did she meet him?’ Bea was ashamed to admit to herself that, instead of sharing Kate’s evident pleasure, she was piqued by the idea that, after years of apparent indifference to the opposite sex, Ellen had beaten her to it. Somehow the natural order of things seemed to have been skewed.
‘They just met and he’s moved in with her already. Well, at least until the kids get back.’
‘What?’ For once Bea was speechless.
‘It’s true. He’s not even forty. And she wants us to meet him. I said I’d tell you to expect a call from her.’
Moved in with her? That couldn’t be right. Ellen would never do anything so hasty. Although she had made some canny snap decisions over the artists she took on at the gallery, outside her work life this was a woman for whom ‘dithering’ was a watchword. But what appeared to be indecision was really circumspection. And Kate didn’t make mistakes. She listened, absorbed what she was told and considered her next course of action. She wouldn’t have told Bea any of this unless she was absolutely sure it was true.
Bea ended the conversation more abruptly than she meant to. She couldn’t share Kate’s pleasure in the news, not just yet. She needed time to take it in, get over her own feelings of what felt horribly close to envy. She was ashamed of herself. What an unpleasant person she must be, if she couldn’t share in a friend’s happiness without thinking of herself first.
But why didn’t Ellen tell me? Bea wondered. We’ve been friends for almost thirty years, seen each other through so much, and yet she told Kate. Kate, to whom Bea had only introduced Ellen about ten years ago when Kate and Paul had moved to London from Manchester. Bea disliked the insidious needle of resentment that pricked her when she was reminded of the strong relationship between her two friends. But it was true that, having introduced them because she thought they’d get on, there were times when she felt the odd one out, such was the bond that had developed between them.
‘What is it, darling? I’ve lost you.’ Adele’s voice brought her back to the present.
‘That was Kate telling me that Ellen’s got herself a man at last.’
‘But that’s wonderful. She’s been lonely for so long.’
‘Lonely?’ That wasn’t the way Bea saw her friend at all. ‘What makes you say that? She’s had the kids, and Simon’s family have always supported her, as well as Kate and me. She’s always said she didn’t want anyone else.’
‘Bea, dear, try to be a little more understanding. Of course lots of people have loved her and looked after her. But that’s not the same as being in love, is it? It’s not the same as having someone special to share things with, someone to provide a buffer against the world outside, someone who makes you feel safe and loved. Your father did all those things for me – all those things that I know you’re looking for yourself, although you’d never put it that way.’ Adele reached across to grasp Bea’s hand while Bea looked away, suddenly self-conscious – her mother knew her far too well.
She wasn’t in the mood to discuss the truth of her own feelings so briskly changed the subject, making her mother laugh as she regaled her with the story of the date who had come to pick her up in his van. When she’d opened the door, the first thing she saw was a made-up double mattress in the back. All she’d let him see of her was her back as she beat a hasty retreat into her house.
By the time Bea and her mother left the pub, everything was back on an even keel and they headed into the nearby town to buy something for supper and to stock up Adele’s fridge for another week.
Chapter 6
When Bea had cut off their conversation so abruptly, Kate had understood exactly what was going on in her friend’s mind. Bea’s emotions were so transparent. But why