Dancing Over the Hill: The new feel good comedy from the author of The Kicking the Bucket List. Cathy Hopkins
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nodded. ‘Me too. He was such a big character, the life and soul, with a hundred interests and opinions on everything, informed and stimulating ones at that.’
‘And now there’s just me here, an empty chair opposite where Alistair used to be, silence where there was conversation and company. Even inside, everything is as he’d left it in his study, a scribbled note on his desk reminding him to get tickets for an author event at Toppings bookshop in town, the history book he was reading on the side table by his armchair, his old cardigan hanging on the back of his desk chair. If I hold it to my face, I can still just about catch the scent of him, woody from the garden where, as you know, he spent most of his time.’
I reached out and put my hand over hers. ‘Oh, Lorna. I know it must be so hard. You know you’re welcome at ours any time you feel like company.’
‘I know, and thanks, but the reality is, he’s gone, and I’d still have to come back and wake up here, have my evenings without him. I’ve been house-hunting in the last week, if only to keep my girls happy, as Jess and Rachel have been on at me again to move. I saw three houses, all perfectly nice, adequate, charming even, but I couldn’t see myself in any of them. What feels right is home, my home, so it’s only confirmed that I don’t want to move. I told the estate agent that I’d be in touch but I won’t.’
‘I can’t blame you for not wanting to go. It’s beautiful here. So peaceful.’ I knew that the house had been in Alistair’s family for three generations, making it doubly hard to let go of.
‘Even though it’s quiet without him, I feel his presence. When I look out on the garden, I’m reminded of the endless trips to nurseries when we began to redesign the layout. It had been so neglected in his parents’ old age. The bare root roses, wild geraniums, alliums, lavender, clematis, jasmine that we bought that will tumble over walls, trellises in June and July, tiny plants we nurtured that now fill the borders, they’re all reminders of him. I couldn’t leave them for someone else to neglect.’
‘Then don’t,’ I said. ‘It’s perfect, and if it gives you comfort being here with all the reminders, then stay.’ She and Alistair had done their homework in the early days and driven all over England looking at National Trust gardens, Sissinghurst, Gertrude Jekyll landscapes. There were years when I remembered they’d pored over gardening books, attended workshops at weekends until they knew exactly what they were doing, before creating the wonderful garden that was in front of us now.
I smiled and took my hand away from Lorna’s. ‘I can still see Alistair out there in his baggy old gardening clothes, on his knees planting or in the greenhouses watering his pride-and-joy tomatoes.’
‘And inside, every room has paintings and artefacts left by his parents, and others we chose together on various holidays. Every one tells a story, to me at least. So no, I don’t want to move yet. Some day. Not yet.’
Suddenly she stood up and shook herself. ‘Enough of being maudlin, Lorna. I’ll think of something,’ she said as she went down the garden to wind a stray stem of clematis around a pergola pole. ‘If Alistair going has taught me anything, it’s that we must seize the day and live our lives fearlessly, Cait: life is short. Sorry. Enough of me and doom and gloom. How are things with you? How’s your lovely dad? And heard any more from that Tom bloke?’
‘Dad’s OK though lonely I think. And no, I haven’t heard from Tom.’
‘Did you delete his friend request?’
‘It’s on my list of things to do when I get back.’ I didn’t need to tell her that I’d accepted Tom’s request if only to satisfy my curiosity. If I unfriended him, she’d never know.
‘You make sure you do it, Cait. How’s Matt?’
‘Same ole.’
‘Same ole good or same ole bad?’
‘Same ole somewhere in the middle. He keeps bringing me tea in bed. His way of making an effort.’
‘I’m sure you’ll get through this.’
‘I know. I’ll give him time.’
‘And yourself, Cait. It’s an adjustment for you too.’
Cait
To do:
Unfriend Tom Lewis.
Make a list of decorating tasks for Matt.
Start clearing out rooms for Airbnb.
Collect rubbish for the tip.
Plant white geraniums in pots at front.
Visit Dad.
*
Resolutions made on the drive over to see Dad in Chippenham.
Stop saying oof and groaning when getting in or out of the car or on or off sofa.
Stop talking out loud to myself.
I usually talk to myself at home so it’s OK, short phrases like, ‘Right, that’s done now.’ Or talking to the plants in the garden after removing bindweed – ‘I think you’ll feel better now.’ However, I found myself doing it in the supermarket this morning when picking up a few things to take to Dad.
‘Don’t forget red peppers,’ I said to myself as I went along the vegetable counters.
‘That’s another off the list,’ I said as I found mushrooms.
‘Good,’ I said as I loaded loo paper onto the trolley. ‘Now, should I get a packet of frozen peas or not?’
An elderly woman by my side gave me a curious look as she picked out potatoes.
I smiled at her and said, ‘I see dead people.’
She didn’t get the movie reference and backed her trolley out of there fast.
*
Dad was sitting on a bench at the front of his bungalow when I arrived and didn’t see me at first. He was wearing his battered panama hat and a light summer jacket and was eating an ice cream with a spoon from a tub. He liked ice cream, and I had a flashback to days out at the seaside when my brother Mike and I were little, and he’d buy 99s for us, those cones with ice cream and a chocolate flake. Blackpool was his favourite place for a trip. He used to go there as a lad with his parents, then later as a young man when he was a ballroom dancer. He’d won prizes in competitions there back in the day, long before Strictly. Whatever the weather, beaches with him were always full of fun: donkey rides, ball games, squealing at the cold waves in the sea. There were always people around on those seaside trips, car-loads full of aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, all laden with sandwiches wrapped in greaseproof paper, bottles of Vimto or dandelion and burdock to drink. The journeys were noisy affairs with lots of banter and singing. The garden at home in summer was the same, with the paddling pool, tennis racquets, cricket bats all deployed. Dad was always first up to play, whatever the game – whether it was croquet, rounders, or running around with the hosepipe soaking us all. And now there he was, a frail old man with white hair, sitting on a bench, shrouded in loneliness. It was evident in the hunch of his shoulders and the slowness of his movements, and it broke my heart to see him like that.
I’d told him time and again that he could come and live with us, but he wouldn’t hear of it. ‘Last thing I want is to be a burden to anyone,’ was his constant reply. After Mum died, he visibly shrank, incomplete without her. He’d always had double energy, a full-time job lecturing at the university, as well as the hobbies, like making wine (my brother Mike and I called it Krudo and would pour it away discreetly as soon as we could when offered a glass). Then came the making of dolls’ houses, and after that barometers and coffee tables. I still