Page 17 of Lessons in Life

‘…I’m giving Jayden a shopping list.’ Jess scribbled a few things on a pad of paper, tearing it off with a flourish. ‘Here you go, Jayden, earn your keep. You know where the Co-op is. And, I hear your latest tour is a sell-out. So, a couple of really good bottles of wine, please?’

* * *

‘I really didn’t want to turf your mum out of her bed.’ Fabian turned with a frown once Mum had put on her coat and gone next door to Jess. ‘Particularly as you said she was so ill with one of her attacks when you had to return from London back in September. Mind you, she’s looking great at the moment. What’s she on?’

‘Well, for the first time since she met him, Mum appears to not want Jayden around. Or at least not in her bed. So, giving up her bed for us means she’s not tempted to fall into it with him again. I know, I know, it’s a very weird relationship they have. Nothing, of course, like your family, all doing things the correct and traditional way. Anyway, Matt Spencer has prescribed her a monthly shot of something called hemin, which limits her body’s production of porphyrins. So, thank goodness for Matt and his team. The medication is really stabilising her condition and letting her get on with life. Even starting again with her life?’ I gave a little laugh. ‘With what she thinks she’s missed. I sat with Mum for a good couple of hours last night and we talked like we’veneverdone before. I’ve always been afraid to face up to what Mum’s had to put up with since being diagnosed when she was in her thirties. Been a bit cowardly, I suppose – frightened that it’s an inherited condition and that she could pass it on to Jess, Sorrel and me.’

‘That why you never mentioned it in London?’

I nodded, slightly ashamed. ‘I didn’t want you running for the hills. You know, being landed with someone who might eventually find themselves showing signs of it.’

‘And you think I’d have left you for that reason? You can’t have a very high opinion of me, Robyn.’

‘Fabian, I had a friend at university whose fiancé gave up on her when she went down with long-term ME. And another girl at uni who was in a relationship with someone who was a haemophiliac. She really loved him but, with his having an inherited genetic disorder, her parents went on at her non-stop about the possibility that any children they might have could either be haemophiliacs or carriers of the condition. Until they broke up.’

‘I’d never heard of acute porphyria before,’ Fabian said.

‘No, it’s very, very rare. Apparently, a cousin of Queen Elizabeth had it and, because he was descended from King George III – you know, the mad king? – they’re now hypothesising that his madness may have been due to an undiagnosed family history of porphyria.’

‘Right?’

‘Oh, hell, Fabian, I can see in your eyes you’re suddenly frightened you might end up with someone talking incessantly and foaming at the mouth…’

‘Well, you do talk a lot, Robyn.’ Fabian bent to kiss my mouth. ‘Sometimes, the only way to shut you up is by kissing you.’ He moved his mouth to my neck, licking my collarbone.

‘I can still talk when you’re doing that, you know,’ I muttered, closing my eyes as the wonderful warmth of his soft mouth descended further and a warm hand reached inside my shirt.

‘Jesus.’ Fabian shot back in alarm. ‘Something’s watching us.’

‘Something? Or someone? Is Sorrel back?’ I turned my head. ‘Oh, it’s only Roger.’

‘Forgot about the bloody rabbit.’ Fabian continued to look wary when all I wanted was for him to carry on with those magical hands and mouth of his. ‘You must be the only family with a rabbit instead of a dog or cat. He’s actually glaring at me,’ Fabian went on.

‘He’s very possessive. Probably thinks you shouldn’t have your hands on me.’ I reached for him once more. ‘ButIdon’t think that at all…’

With Roger, now in obvious protective mode, moving in on Fabian, I went to fetch wine and glasses from the kitchen. ‘The problem is,’ I called from the fridge, ‘with my mum being adopted at birth, there’s no way of knowing if her conditionisinherited. It’s a bit weird – Mum’s never really been able to venture far or over-extend herself. But now, with her refusal to let Jayden just swan back in as he always expects to do, I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s finally ready to move on. Come on, a glass of wine here for Dutch courage and then I’ll take you round to meet the famous reggae singer himself.’

7

‘Hi, Fabian, come on in and make yourself at home.’ Jess, obviously flustered at cooking for a fellow cooking enthusiast, batted Lola away from the shabby chintz-covered armchair at one end of her tiny kitchen.

‘Something smells good.’ Fabian, walking over to Jess and the stove, appeared equally nervous at being surrounded for the first time by the Allen women en masse, and I felt for him. ‘What are you cooking? Oh, fabulous,’ he enthused, handing over an upmarket bottle of Malbec. ‘Is that sea bass? And with razor clams? I’ve never quite mastered the intricacies of how to cook those.’ The pair of them immediately went into a huddle over ingredients and cooking know-how and I smiled, delighted that Jess wasn’t going to be arsy as she sometimes could be when unsure of herself.

‘Hello.’ Jayden, who’d been upstairs obviously settling himself into Jess’s tiny box room, appeared in the kitchen. ‘Good to meet you at last. Fabian, isn’t it?’

‘You know it is, Jayden.’ I tutted, taking in my dad’s unshaven face and dreadlocked hair, his jeans and grubby trainers. Goodness, what a contrast to Fabian’s father, Roland Carrington, Lord Chief Justice.

‘Hi.’ Fabian held out a hand, realised it was still attached to the wooden spoon he’d automatically picked up, and laughed. ‘Pleased to meet you, Jayden.’

‘D’you think you could all take yourselves next door?’ Jess frowned, her face red. ‘I can’t concentrate when the whole of my kitchen’s filled with bodies.’

‘Next door?’ Mum and I both pulled a face. ‘We’ve just come from round there.’

‘No,’ Jess tutted. ‘Nextroom. The sitting room. Lola, hand these round,’ she instructed, passing over a plate of perfectly arranged tiny Brie and prosciutto shortbreads. ‘We’re going to be ready to eat in fifteen minutes.’

‘Mum, where’s Sorrel?’ I asked, following Lola, who was intent on ushering the others into the sitting room where a log fire burned brightly. ‘Oh, she’s here now.’

We all turned to face Sorrel, who stood in the kitchen doorway, wrapped up in a black puffer coat but still in the navy St Mede’s school uniform.

---