Page 34 of Out of Control

He left with a cheery wave, a handshake for Dorothea and the order to send him lots of photos in real time because it was going to be a lonely evening by himself in the pub.

Dorothea was raising and lowering her arm and watching the stork bob up and down in response. She was like a toddler entranced by a helium balloon for the first time. She took a few steps and the giant bird followed like an obedient pet. She changed the ribbon from right to left hand and repeated her circular walk, the delight on her face growing with every movement. “These weren’t invented when I was a child.” She swapped arms again and gave short little jerks before stretching upwards, the stork almost reaching the ceiling. “Or, if they were, we couldn’t afford them.”

Adele untied the handles of the bulging carrier. It disgorged balloons like a mouth blowing bubbles through a hoop of soapy liquid. The hall ceiling became dotted with spheres of pink declaring ‘It’s a girl!’ Dorothea giggled in a way that Fiona neverremembered her doing before. Fiona put her arms around the older and younger generation. “It’s going to be a good night!”

“Agreed!” Adele high-fived her.

Dorothea gave another smile of delight and held her raised palm towards the other two women. They both returned the palm-smacking gesture.

A second knock at the door brought them back to attention. Dorothea started to turn the handle.

“Wait — the balloons might escape in the wind!” Adele gave little jumps to pull the stray pink celebratory bubbles from the ceiling, pushed them into the lounge and closed the door.

Meeko was on the doorstep in plain clothes and he smiled at Dorothea gripping her balloon. “So, the rumour’s true,” he said to the old lady.

“What?”

“Babies really are delivered by storks.”

Dorothea’s face melted into another girlish giggle and she almost pulled Meeko inside. “We have to be careful of the breeze.”

Fiona saw her best friend standing there in all his handsome, lithe glory and felt suddenly and confusingly proud. “Ladies,” she announced, “let me present Meeko, our Father Christmas for the evening. Meeko, this is Adele, our star mum-to-be, and this is my mother, Dorothea.”

“Also a star,” said Adele, and then blushed when Fiona smiled appreciatively at her.

Meeko shook hands with each of the two women. When he reached Fiona she leaned slightly towards him, expecting their usual peck on the cheek and anticipating the clean, natural male smell that she loved about him. He seemed to hesitate for a second before kissing her briefly, and then he turned to Adele, pointing at the holdall in his right hand. “Where can I getchanged and what’s the plan? Do you want me to stay hidden until a certain moment?”

Inexplicably, Fiona felt slighted, as though something had changed in their relationship.Don’t be silly. It’s Adele’s evening and Meeko is treating it as such. It’s not personal.The two of them went upstairs, with Adele leading the way in her lumbering baby elephant-style.

After that the guests started to arrive and there was no time to think, never mind dwell on some, possibly imagined, slight by Meeko. Fiona and Dorothea were in and out of the kitchen with drinks, plates and cups. Her mother was slow but careful. Fiona tried hard not to hurry the old lady when they both needed the same bottle of wine or tray of mini-Yorkshires keeping warm in the oven. Adele had selected all the supermarket party food advertised on TV for Christmas buffets.

“Why not?” she’d declared on their second joint shopping trip. “We’ve got Dad’s credit card.”

But still Fiona had worried about not having enough and, off her own bat, had done a pile of the derided ‘children’s party’ food as well. Now it was being tackled enthusiastically and Adele was complimented on her ‘retro’ theme. The young woman was generous enough to explain each time that their family friend, Fiona, had created all the time-warp food.

The volume of chatter in the lounge rose and people spilled into the hallway and kitchen. Fiona had been anxious about too many people invading her space, standing in the nooks and crannies of her home and shedding crumbs, drips and dirt from outside. But now it was happening, the anxiety had been replaced by a pleasant feeling of warmth and joint enterprise. Since the divorce, she’d never thrown a party. Parties and guests couldn’t be controlled. It was impossible to hand people a list of rules on arrival or to have twenty pairs of shoes lining the hallway to stop dirt being trodden in, or to ask people to keepstill so that the flaky pastry vol-au-vent cases didn’t do as their name suggested and fly off the plate at the slightest hint of a breeze. But those worries had fled through the door when the first guest arrived. It felt joyful to have such unbridled happiness and good wishes for Adele happening under her roof.

Her mother had helped herself to a large glass of red wine and taken a seat between two of Adele’s school friends on the settee. The young women appeared enthralled by the old lady’s description of their school nearly seventy years ago when Dorothea had been head girl. Fiona took the opportunity to slip upstairs and check on Meeko in case he needed help with his costume.

“How are you doing?” Adele had installed him in her own room. The door was ajar but Fiona stayed on the landing, waiting to be invited in, in case he wasn’t decent. “Do you need any help?”

“I’m fine. You stay downstairs with your guests.”

“They’re not my guests, you are, and I appreciate you helping out.”

“Don’t forget you offered me money and I can’t afford to turn that down.”

There was a hardness in his voice that she hadn’t heard before. She didn’t know if it was meant for her or whether it was a reaction to his financial predicament. “I’ll fetch the sack of presents,” she said. It had taken her, Adele and Joe a whole evening to wrap thirty gifts for Santa to distribute. Adele had decided that she needed to be involved in buying the presents in case Fiona got it completely wrong by choosing cold cream or some other old-lady thing. She had spent ages on the internet trying to find something that would be a lasting reminder of the occasion and which the guests could take back to their respective far-flung unis. She’d decided on hinged silver-effect photo frames with space for two pictures, one either side of the centralhinge. Santa would take a picture of the whole group and also a selfie of himself with each guest and Adele. The pictures would be printed and sent out in new year cards with instructions to place them in the frames and to carry them forward into the future with Adele’s warmest wishes.

Meeko came out of the bedroom suddenly, bumping into Fiona with his extended belly. She staggered backwards into the bathroom.

“Sorry. I . . .” He looked as though he’d been about to say more, but instead he hoisted the sack onto his shoulder and went downstairs.

Fiona wanted to cry. Their relationship was out of kilter. Something had changed and she didn’t know what or why. He began ho-ho-hoing as he reached the hallway. This was followed by excited laughter and a rise in the general volume from the party. Fiona swallowed, blinked, forced a smile and went down to observe.

She and Adele had set up a mini grotto against the far wall of the lounge. Two large pot plants framed the settee and Adele had strung multi-coloured tinsel from one to the other, like a fairyland washing line. She’d wrapped a string of tiny tree lights around the stem of each plant and these now twinkled in a magical fashion. Santa sat in the middle of the settee with Adele on his left and a slowly changing occupant on his right. There was much embarrassed giggling as he asked them what they wanted for Christmas and then pulled both girls in close for the selfie. When all the guests had received their gifts, there was one present left in the sack. Adele called Dorothea forward, introducing her as her new grandmother-by-proxy. The wine had gone to her mother’s head and she was escorted to the settee in a wavering line. Fiona moved nearer to properly hear the interaction between Meeko and her mother.

“Now tell me, young lady, what would you like Santa to bring you for Christmas?”

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