Page 54 of Jenny James Is Not a Disaster
“Make yourselves at home, Charlie, Luke,” my mum says, gesturing through to the lounge. “And, Jenny, perhaps you could help me with the tea?”
I follow her through, along the hallway, and as she opens the door, I gasp.
“You’ve got a new kitchen!” I utter, turning around and taking in the shining new cabinets and ultra-modern appliances. It iscompletely different from the slightly shabby version I remember, with the battered pine table and the old woodburning stove.
“Yes, well—we’re not spring chickens anymore, are we? Thought it was time to enjoy a few creature comforts in our dotage... So, Charlie. How old is he?”
She is busying herself with the kettle, with getting a tray together, with retrieving milk from the enormous fridge, so I can’t see the expression on her face. Perhaps that is a deliberate thing, I think, as I realize why she is asking the question.
“He’s eighteen, Mum. He’s Rob’s son.”
“Ah,” she replies simply, slicing up the lemon drizzle cake and arranging it on a plate. “And Rob... how is he?”
We are suddenly on very dangerous ground. I can tell from the way she is holding herself, from her lack of eye contact, that she knows this as well. So much has happened since I last saw her, and I can only imagine how hard it is for her not to pin me down and interrogate me immediately. But this is awkward terrain for me too—I don’t want to lie, but perhaps the last vestiges of my pride don’t want to let me confess that she was right all along, that Rob was the ne’er-do-well they always suspected, that I made a terrible mistake and should have listened to them.
“He’s fine,” I reply breezily. “We’re not together anymore, but that happens, doesn’t it? He’s doing well. He lives in Paris. He’s in regular contact with Charlie.”
I have no idea why I am defending Rob, trying to make the situation sound better than it is, but somehow I am.
Mum turns around to face me at last, and I steel myself for judgment, for a sniping comment, for a veiled told-you-so.
“And how long has he been gone for?” she asks directly.
Now she has asked that particular question, I know that I cannot lie—apart from anything else, I can’t expect Charlie tocover for me. Charlie doesn’t even remember his dad living with us, and she will discover that.
“He left when Charlie was two,” I say quietly, biting my lip and looking at my feet. Flip-flops. Jeez. I could have at least painted my toenails.
“So you raised that lovely boy all alone? Luke isn’t... more than a friend?”
“No, he’s not. And yes, I did.”
I find it in myself to meet her piercing stare, and feel a rush of adrenaline. This is how it can be with me and my mum; this is how I remember it. Even if we both try really, really hard, we seem able to skip forward to conflict, real or perceived, within seconds.
“Well, it looks like you did a marvelous job, darling. He seems like a lovely young man, and you must be very proud—of him, and of yourself. Now, shall we go through?”
She sweeps away past me with her tray, and I am left floundering in the alien high-tech kitchen. That, I think, shaking my head as I follow her, was not what I expected at all. The adrenaline fades, is replaced with something warmer and kinder.
By the time I join them in the living room, everyone is perched on sofas and chairs, and Mum is pouring the tea. Her movements are, as ever, precise and measured, and she doesn’t even spill a drop. I remain unconvinced that I am genetically related to this woman.
Charlie bites into his cake and immediately goes into that blissed-out sugar trance I am so familiar with.
“Wow, this is amazing!” he says after the first mouthful. “Are you sure you two are related?”
It is so close to what I was thinking myself that it makes me laugh, and the low-level awkwardness of the moment is dissipated.
“Jenny was never interested in learning to cook,” my mother says, stirring her tea. “She assured me that she would be rich and famous and would always have a private chef.”
“Ha! Well, that didn’t go to plan...,” Charlie says, looking around him. It must be so odd for him, after all this time, after all these years of half-truths and evasions, to finally be here.
“So, Mum, where’s Dad?” I ask. “Is he on the farm?”
There is a terrible split second when I wonder what she is about to say—whether he is still around at all.
“Oh. Of course, you don’t know. Well, we sold the farm. We still own the fields immediately around the house, and the garden at the back, but the rest isn’t ours anymore.”
“But... Dad loves the farm! It’s been in the family for so long... and I saw the cows on the way in!”
“I said we’d sold it, Jenny, not expunged it from existence. Nice couple bought it; they’ve gone organic. Make marvelous yogurts. I know it must be a surprise, but there was no way around it really. Your father is seventy-five now, dear, and his health has been, well, I suppose you’d call it patchy. He simply couldn’t carry on doing so much of it himself, and Richard made it clear that he didn’t want to take it over. It got to the stage where we were paying more and more people to do the work for us, and it simply wasn’t viable. He was upset at first, but he’s settled into it now. It’s meant we can have a nice retirement, and a shiny new kitchen, and he was consoled by his alpacas.”
