Page 15 of The Spark

Half = ex-work colleague who I never see. Surname?

Fraser

His reply is instant.

Nope. Should I?

This is too messed up. I should just cut off all contact with Ash and forget I ever met him.

And yet.

No worries, mix up.

Chapter 8.

On Wednesday lunchtime, I call in to Mum’s. It’s only a fifteen-minute walk from the KLI offices, so I try to pop round a couple of times a week.

Even people who aren’t fussed about house porn struggle not to be impressed by my mother’s sprawling, four-storey Edwardian end terrace. It makes her seem wealthier than she is, and might also explain why property developers keep asking her out.

She and Dad panic-bought the house nearly three decades ago, when the Golden Triangle was still affordable, and Dad had just received a never-to-be-repeated pay rise and bonus. The place is undeniably gorgeous – red-bricked with high ceilings, brimming with features and character detailing, like stained glass and ceiling roses, cornicing and cast-iron fireplaces, and stunning original tiles in the hallway. But Mum has never bothered to maintain it, and over the years, the place has slid into disrepair.

A small part of me has always hoped that one day, she and I might restore the house together, return it to its former glory. She has a modest pot of savings, earmarked for a future renovation – I just need her to give me the green light and I’ll be ready to sand surfaces and fill cracks and call in the damp-proofing people, get the roof fixed. But every time I bring it up, she changes the subject. I guess she’s got used to the patchy paint and brown blooms of moisture, leaks in strange places and rotting timbers. It’s mostly sound, if she treads carefully and doesn’t try to peel back any carpets or wallpaper, and there’s always something more pressing she can spend the money on, I guess. But to me, a house as beautiful as this deserves to be cared for, cherished, loved.

‘Is that you, Neve?’

‘Yep.’

‘Phew. Thought you were Ralph.’ Mum comes bustling downstairs in a silk kimono, cigarette in hand, then kisses me on both cheeks. It makes me cringe, this pretentious imitation she’s always trying to do of a glamourpuss. I inherited the slight build of my father, but Mum is full-figured, all curves and proportions. She has a dramatic head of thick, dark curls that tumble past her face and bounce around her shoulders. The silk kimono exposes her cleavage.

‘Why don’t you want to see Ralph?’ I ask her suspiciously. Whenever my mother has a new love interest, she gets bristly with Ralph, the sweet, gentle man who I suspect has been faithfully in love with her for nearly fifteen years. She reckons they’re just friends, but he’s always here, and I see how he looks at her.

‘Oh, you know,’ she says, waving a hand through the air, drawing on her cigarette and wafting past me.

‘No?’ I follow her through to the kitchen.

‘Sometimes I just need a bit of space,’ she says. ‘You know?’

I roll my eyes, not bothering to remind her how many times Ralph has picked her up off the floor over the years, literally and figuratively.

‘Tea?’ she says. ‘You’ll have to have it black, though. No milk.’

‘Fine,’ I say, pulling up a chair at the farmhouse-style table at the far end of the kitchen.

Mum fills the ancient kettle and plonks it on top of the equally ancient Aga. The table is crammed with dirty glasses and bowls doubling as ashtrays, Guardian newspapers so old they’ve turned crispy – all of them undoubtedly unread. There are empty wine bottles and half-punched pill packets, and... There it is. An elaborate bouquet of flowers, their effect slightly diminished by the rinsed-out coffee jar they’ve been stuffed into.

I resist the urge to get up and tidy, wipe surfaces, take the bins out. I have done, in the past, before realising that attempting to tame the disorder in my mother’s house is a bit like trying to hold back an avalanche using only my hands.

‘Who’re the flowers from?’

‘Hmm?’ She’s playing for time.

I speak slowly and loudly, as if there’s a language barrier. ‘Who are the flowers from?’

‘Just a friend.’

‘Ralph?’

She snorts. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

---