Page 7 of The Twelve Dates of Christmas
“Can you believe it?” her mum went on. “Barbados for Christmas!”
Kate could believe it. She felt a prickle of guilt at the relief she felt.
“How did that come about?” Kate asked.
“Well,” said her mum. “I sold a yacht for a gentleman last week and he said he had another one he’s been thinking of selling, moored out in Barbados. Anyway, he showed me some photographs and I said Barbados was a bit out of our remit. And before I knew what was happening, he’d spoken to Serge—you remember Serge, don’t you, darling? Myboss? Took a shine to you when you came over last year. You could do a lot worse than Serge, Katy-Boo, age is just a number, you know, and men can go on producing viable sperm until the day they die...”
“Mum!” said Kate.
“Hmm? Where was I?” asked her mum.
“The boatman had spoken to Serge,” Kate prompted.
“Oh, yes,” said her mum. “So he spoke to Serge and I was personally commissioned to come out here and value it. We’re staying on it to get a feel for it!”
“Wow,” said Kate. “That’s amazing. I bet Gerry was pleased.”
“He’s over the moon, darling. A free holiday! He hasn’t worn trousers since we landed.”
This was more information than Kate needed. She winced as a vision of Gerry in Speedos flashed before her eyes.
Gerry was in his midsixties, tall with terra-cotta skin and thick gray hair, immaculately styled like Barbie’s plastic boyfriend, Ken. In Gerry it seemed her mother had finally met her match. He was dynamic, he always had a deal on the table, and he’d always spent the commission before it hit the bank.
Her mum’s affairs had always been with men of Gerry’s ilk, but for one reason or another his predecessors had always come up short; the bubbly was cheap and the fast cars were rentals. Her mum wasn’t stupid; she wasn’t going to throw in all her chips for someone who, beyond the dinner jacket, could only offer her the same life she already had with Mac. As soon as they invited her back to their three-bedroom duplex in Deptford, her ardor chilled quicker than the fake champagne on ice.
An outsider might assume that her parents’ marriage had been unhappy, but in truth, it wasn’t; unconventional, certainly, but not altogether unhappy.
Her dad knew about her mum’sdalliances—not the details, of course, it was all very discreet—but somehow he lived with them on the understanding that she would always come home to him at the end of the night.
And her mum had needed Mac like a compass, or a buoy, to stop her from drifting into danger. His gravitational pull kept her centered and she was always happy to return to the safety of his orbit after a wandering. It was a state of denial that had suited them both, until Gerry cruised into their lives.
“The nights are so balmy, we’ve been sleeping on the balcony, completely naked!” said her mum. “There’s a salon in the bay and a sweet girl gave me a Brazilian wax. Have you tried it, darling? It’s so much coolerdown there!”
Kate shook her head to try to erase the image and changed the subject.
“So when will you be back?” she asked.
“We fly back to Spain on the twenty-ninth,” said her mum. “Why don’t you come over and spend New Year’s with us? You’d love it.”
“Maybe next year,” said Kate.
She could hear her mother pouting on the other end of the line.
“Oh, tut-tut, darling, you always say that!” said her mum. “What are you waiting for? I could set you up with a hundred different men out here. It’s not much to ask that I have grandchildren before I’m too old to pick them up!”
“Mum!” said Kate.
“I’m just saying,” she said. “None of us are getting any younger...”
“Mum!”
“Okay, okay,” said her mum. “How’s Mac?”
“He’s fine,” said Kate. “He’s great, actually.”
Kate wished she had something to say about her dad that would impress her mum, or make her think she might be missing out; she doubted his sprout trees, tall as they were, would do the trick.
Mac was a quiet doer. He’d retired from the civil service but kept his hand in on a consultancy basis. He grew things and he fixed things. He took long walks in the country and made notes for the RSPB on the birds that visited his handmade bird tables and feeders. These were things Kate loved about her dad, but they were not enough to light her mum’s touch paper. And there, Kate supposed, was the problem; her mum had always been the rocket to her dad’s Roman candle.
