‘Tonight? But I’ve got your dinner ready’
‘No…not tonight, next Friday’ He follows her along the narrow hallway to the kitchen, still wearing a stunned smile.
‘So what?’ Jessie lifts the lid on the saucepan of potatoes and gives them a testing prod with a fork. ‘You’re always going out somewhere with somebody’ she says offhand. ‘I lose track. That’s why I only ever say ‘Hello, dear’ if you’ve got one with you. I never know if it’s the same one as the last time…. and most times, it isn’t’
‘Oi, grumpy!’ Nathan chides. ‘I’m not late’ He flicks the switch on the kettle and checks the teapot set ready on a tray before reaching into the cupboard above the worktop for the canister of teabags. ‘What’s got your goat?’ he asks, dropping three into the pot and putting it back.
‘You try watching a film through snow’ Jessie says tetchily, peering into the oven then closing the door. ‘I can’t knit if I haven’t got something to watch and I gave up trying to watch that’
‘I’ll go and have a look. I got time have I?’
‘Ten minutes’
‘Let me check it out now and I’ll sort it after dinner. I brought a ladder’ Nathan pinches her cheek and smiles.
‘Wondered why you’d come in that damned great thing’ Jessie grumbles, turning down the gas under the potatoes and following him into the living room.
Nathan prods the on switch and sits on his haunches in front of the television.
‘Look at it! I’ve fiddled and fiddled but it wouldn’t come right’
‘It is a bit of a mess’ he agrees ‘but the aerial doesn’t seem to have moved. I had a quick look before I rang the door’ He stands up and looks over the set to the wires behind.
‘All the plugs are in!’ Jessie says defensively ‘I’m not that daft’
‘Just checking’ he grins. ‘You’re not going to believe this, though’
Jessie cranes her neck to see behind the television as Nathan turns it round.
‘Not this…my date!’
‘Go on…try me’
‘She’s only a bloody vicar’s daughter!’ He laughs as he kneels and starts to follow the aerial cable from the jack in the back of the set to the socket on the wall.
‘Is that what they tell you these days if they’re trying to convince you they don’t sleep around?’
‘Straight up. Her Dad’s the vicar in Oatfield. I dropped her off at the vicarage’
‘I was…I have. She was there as well. Marie brought her. She helps out at the library sometimes. She works in the Woodbury one…and’ He smiles broadly and looks up ‘ the best bit of all…’
‘There’s a best bit? The poor girl doesn’t know what she’s letting herself in for’ Jessie rolls her eyes, his obvious exhilaration going some way to restoring her good humour.
‘Shush up…SHE is the girl I saw…in the pub…when I thought I’d made a prat of myself….remember?’
‘How could I forget?’ she huffs, folding her arms. ‘Got a bottom lip on you like a dinner plate. You weren’t any fun at all that night’
‘I’ll have to practice being on my best behaviour’ he says, becoming serious.
‘That’ll be a first’ Jessie laughs.
‘At least for when I meet her Dad, she seems okay’ Nathan nods, still solemn. ‘And there’s your problem!’ he says with a satisfied smile.
‘What?’
‘A mouse, at a guess. Chewed into the cable’
‘Blerrgghh! In my front room?’
‘’fraid so. I’ll set a trap’
‘Noo….you can’t hurt it!’
‘You’ll have to do something; otherwise it’ll have a go at all sorts. They’re not fussy what they eat. What’s the picture like now?’ he asks.
‘Better’ Jessie sounds surprised.
‘It’s had a real go at it but it hasn’t gone right through. It’s been laying against metal somewhere, I expect’ he says, looking for any likely cause. ‘You’ve got yards of cable, I’ll chop it off and stick the jack back on the end’
‘Oh lovely… but you’d better come and have your dinner first’ Jessie beams delightedly. ‘Leave it for now’ she instructs, turning to leave the room.
‘So you’re meeting the parents already?’ Jessie asks as Nathan washes his hands at the kitchen sink.
‘I’m picking her up. There’s always the off chance one of them might answer the door or something’ Nathan grimaces.
‘You’re not just going to sit at the gate and wait?’
‘You think I could get away with that?’ He asks hopefully as he takes a towel from the hook on the back door.
Jessie narrows her eyes and looks at him. ‘You want to make a good impression, or what?’
‘Yeah….I do. God, Jess, I can’t believe it!’ He hugs her off of the ground.
‘Will you put me down! I’ve got spuds to see to’
‘She wants to go out with me…ME! Jeeze’
‘You’ll have to stop saying that for a start’ Jessie admonishes as he sets her down again.
‘I will, won’t I? Yes. This is going to be good, Jess…I’ve got to make it good…I’ve got to BE good. I don’t want to muck this up. God, I feel sick’
‘Flipping heck….anyone would think you were sixteen and you hadn’t got your leg over yet’
‘Make that fourteen and that’s just what it feels like’
‘Fourteen? Crikey Moses!’
‘Do I need a haircut?’
Rose Cottage, Albans Lane
Chapter Nineteen
‘Did you see Evelyn over the weekend? You said you were going’ Kath Wishart asks as she cuts her teacake into four.
‘I intended to’ Jessie replies, turning from the large plate glass window at the front of the café and letting the draped net curtain fall back into place. ‘But then Anthony rang and said that his wife was fetching her out for a couple of hours and would it be alright if they popped in instead’
‘And did they?’ Kath looks out of the window to see what has drawn Jessie’s attention and smiles at the sight of two muscular young men standing chatting on the other side of the road.
‘Oh…yes…that was fun’ Jessie rolls her eyes as she takes a sip of her tea.
Kath chuckles ‘How come?’
‘Every one of my cupboards opened and inspected’
‘And did they pass muster?’
‘There were no children in them’ Jessie replies wryly.
‘Children?’
‘She thinks I’m my mother and with the brood she had, Evelyn was wondering what had happened to them’
‘She still remembers some things then?’
Jessie sighs and sets her cup back in its saucer. ‘Fifty years ago like it was yesterday. I’m not sure it’s remembering, exactly…more that she’s slipped into some time warp’ She gives a sad shake of her head as she butters her scone. ‘I’d forgotten how vinegar-tongued she was. Nothing changed as she got older, nothing at all. It’s just that she was more careful then, craftier…now she just outs with it. My mother must have done ‘awfully well’ considering that Jessie lived in little more than a hovel’
‘Oh…what a dreadful thing to say!’ Kath exclaims
‘I didn’t pay any mind to it’ Jessie says, sinking her teeth into the floury top. ‘I know we didn’t have much but we were pretty happy for all that. My mum worked her fingers to the bone looking after us lot. The house was shabby but it was spotlessly clean’
‘You come from a big family?’ Kath tilts her head to the side in enquiry. ‘I’ve never heard you talk about them. I know your nieces and nephews made Christmas for you last year and they visit but I’ve never heard you talk about your brothers and sisters’
‘Just me left now…’ Jessie says with a small shrug of her shoulders and a dab of her paper serviette to her lips. She wipes her fingers. ‘Apart from Clifford….’ She adds with a wistful sigh. ‘He was the youngest boy, just eleven months older than me. I don’t even know if he’s still alive’
‘You’re not in touch at all?’
‘Haven’t seen hide not hair of him for almost sixty years. There was a spot of bother and he took off’ she explains as Kath draws a sympathetic breath through her teeth. ‘We never saw him again. Broke my mother’s heart, he was the apple of her eye’
‘What a shame’
‘It was. We’d’ve all stood by him. He knew that but it didn’t make any difference, he still went. Took after his father’
‘Ah…’ Kath nods knowingly ‘That sort of bother’
‘Long time ago now and I doubt anyone remembers…Edna might. She knew him. All the old folk…them that are left, they’d know about it maybe’ Jessie sits with her cup in her hand and a faraway look in her eyes. ‘Poor girl used to come and stand at our gate waiting for him. She wasn’t all there, poor thing. We tried to explain but she didn’t really understand’
‘Is that why he left?’
Jessie focuses again and purses her lips. ‘No. Silly young fool should have left it in his trousers where it belonged!’ she huffs. ‘He went with her and her father got to find out. I think she told him. Very naïve she was…like I said, not all there. Thought that meant she was going to be marrying him and was that excited. From there it somehow got turned into her old man accusing Cliff of rape. He was off like a jackrabbit. There’s no way he would force himself on anyone. He liked the girlies, no doubt about that but rape? …No, I don’t think so’ she says firmly and her eyes fill with unexpected tears. ‘He was only a boy…so young…but so bloody stupid!’
‘Aren’t all young lads like that?’ Kath remarks.
‘They don’t think any further than the next bonk, that’s true’ Jessie sniffs ‘…but her? I mean, she was a bit older than him and looked like a woman…if you get what I mean…very well developed… but to say that she was simple would be a kindness’
‘I don’t suppose that made a difference when it came down to it’
‘No…probably not’ Jessie agrees, lapsing into thoughtful silence.
‘And he’s not been in touch or anything since?’ Kath turns the teapot handle toward her and refills their cups.
‘Nope…nobody knows what happened to him’
‘You’d have thought….after a while, when things had died down a bit, he would have contacted your mother, at least’
‘You would…but no, nothing’
‘Have you tried to trace him?’
‘I’m not sure that I want to. He hasn’t bothered with any of us, why should I be bothered about him?’
‘Because you’re still fond of him, despite what you say, I can tell by the way you look when you talk about him’ Kath says gently.
Jessie uses her serviette to blot under her glasses. ‘He was such a lovely boy…but the way he hurt my mother by leaving; I don’t know that I could ever forgive him that. She went to her grave not knowing and I daresay I shall go to mine the same way too’
‘Oh, I’d have to find out’ Kath leans back in her chair ‘Even if I didn’t want to actually meet them. I’d have to find out what happened to them. It would drive me mad otherwise’
‘It’s been so long, I wouldn’t know where to start’
The Old Mill Cafe
