What Women Want. Fanny Blake

not the man who had fathered Ben. She knew Ben recognised that too and was hurt by it. He didn’t want to go round to Colin and Carrie’s to have it rubbed in his face, but Colin didn’t understand that. He thought that by including Ben every now and then he was completing his happy family. Happy families – huh!

      Her attention was brought back to the road as she joined the exit to the motorway too fast and came screaming up beside a red Saab that had earlier overtaken her. The two young guys turned and the passenger screwed his finger to his head, mouthing something at her. For God’s sake. She stuck her tongue out at them as they roared off. Not very grown-up, Bea, she admonished herself. All the same she felt much better.

      Instead of returning to Ben, her mind flitted to Coldharbour. How safe was her job? She knew Adam Palmer’s reputation as a ruthless, manipulative boss who would do anything to raise his staff’s so-called performance levels. In his last incarnation, he’d turned round an ailing Pennant Publishing by wasting no time in getting rid of all the dead wood, building a small and fiercely loyal team who had successfully shaped and tightened the list. Would he be bringing any of them with him? If he did, how would that affect her?

      As she approached the outskirts of Harmchester, she took a right into the narrow lane that led to her mother’s house. She loved the drive down there, so familiar that memories of her childhood rushed into her mind as she turned into the open gate at the top of the drive, which led to the house that stood just as it had since she, Will and Jess had been brought up there.

      She crunched over the gravel to the porch, a relatively recent addition to the faded but still elegant Georgian house. Gumboots crowded the small space below the ancient duffel coats and scarves that she, her brother and sister had forgotten when they’d finally left home. It was just as if they were about to return. Housekeeping had never been her mother’s strongest point, she reflected, noticing the dried mud on the flagstones, and the cobwebs above her head. Even Miss Havisham might have set slightly higher standards. However, at least she and her siblings had been allowed to get on with their own lives, blessed with a mother who would take her independence to the grave with her, if she had any control over her future. And let’s hope she does, Bea willed.

      ‘Mum! Where are you?’ she yelled, as she let herself into the dim panelled hallway. Bending to pick up a few scattered letters, mostly bills and mail-order catalogues from the floor, she balanced them in the minimal space available on the small gate-legged table that held the phone.

      She called again, putting her head round the door into the sitting room. The knitting left mid-row on the comfy plum-coloured sofa and the voices from Any Questions? on the radio signalled that Adele couldn’t be far away. The gilt mirror over the mantelpiece could have done with a good dusting and the hearth might have benefited from being cleaned out. The books were crammed higgledy-piggledy onto the shelves at either side of the chimney breast. Not for the first time, Bea thought her mother might benefit from moving to somewhere smaller. They had talked about the huge task it would involve, but Adele was waiting until the time was right. Whatever that meant.

      ‘Mum!’ She heard the familiar edge of impatience creep into her voice. Making a mental note to control it, she tried once more. ‘Mum.’ Better.

      ‘Here, dear. I’m in the kitchen . . .’ The crash that followed made Bea run down the flagged corridor past the stairs and through the door at the end of the passage. Her mother was on the floor, rubbing her leg, surrounded by saucepans and the rail that was supposed to suspend them within easy reach above the ancient Aga.

      ‘What on earth are you doing? Are you all right?’ Bea’s relief at seeing her in one piece swiftly turned to exasperation. She righted a fallen chair to where it belonged under the table, trying not to let her irritation show.

      ‘I’m absolutely fine. I was just trying to straighten the rail. I suppose I should have taken the pans off first. I just pulled a bit too hard and the whole thing collapsed.’ Adele rubbed her elbow where she’d caught it on the Aga.

      ‘But why didn’t you wait for me to do it for you? We’ve talked about this thousands of times. You could have been hurt.’ Bea couldn’t stop the edge creeping back into her voice.

      ‘Oh, rubbish, darling. I didn’t want to bother you. Anyway, I wasn’t expecting you,’ she announced breezily.

      As Adele got to her feet, brushing plaster dust off her cardigan, Bea registered that she was still wearing her pyjama bottoms and slippers. ‘But, Mum, I’ve come to take you out to lunch. Don’t you remember? We arranged it on Wednesday.’

      Adele rolled her eyes to the Kitchen Maid adorned with damp tea towels and her underwear. ‘Of course. How stupid of me. I’ll just be a minute.’

      ‘But you’re not even dressed yet.’

      ‘Nor I am.’ Her mother dived into the laundry basket for some tights. ‘It won’t take me long, darling.’ She disappeared along the corridor and up the stairs.

      Bea stayed where she was, bending to pick up the pans. Should she be more concerned about Adele? Her feelings of responsibility for her mother weighed heavy even though she knew they weren’t wanted. If something happened to Adele, it would be her fault. After all, of the three children, she was the one who lived closest. Will had married his Australian girlfriend and won the bonus prize of a new life in Sydney while Jess was wrapped up in her perfect family of one long-suffering husband and two children (she’d have had the point-four if she could have arranged it) in spick-and-span heaven outside Edinburgh. Bea resolved to bring up the subject of moving house again, but not right now. She didn’t want to spoil the afternoon ahead.

      Tempted though she was to do the bit of washing-up piled by the sink, she ignored it, knowing that her mother would only take her help as a form of criticism. Instead she returned to the sitting room to put the fireguard in place before standing and staring out of the window at the long garden stretching towards the copse beyond. Just the sight of it brought back all those years of hide-and-seek, bonfires, camping. If only Ben could have enjoyed the place in the same way, but childhood was different these days. Nobody was thrown outside after lunch and told to ‘go and play’ for a couple of hours any more. She could imagine Ben’s reaction if she’d ever dared to try.

      ‘I’m ready.’ Adele came into the room, having put on a taupe cotton skirt with a neat white blouse, car keys in hand.

      ‘I’ll drive, Ma.’ Although Adele’s doctor seemed to think she was still capable, the idea of her mother driving scared the hell out of Bea. She wasn’t frightened for Adele but for everybody else on the road. ‘You can navigate.’

      ‘Where are we going again?’

      ‘The Hare and Hounds in Ludborough. If we get there early enough we’ll be able to sit outside.’

      The lanes were almost empty as Bea drove, ignoring Adele’s uncertain directions and relying on the satnav. They arrived without mishap and pulled into the already busy car park alongside the pub. Above the porch, darkened windows winked out from behind the profusion of vivid pink and red petunias, yellow golden eye and trailing blue lobelia crammed into the window boxes. Mother and daughter picked their way through the dim lounge bar, ordering their drinks en route, and out into the back garden, blinking at the sudden light.

      It was the best kind of English summer’s day – blue sky with puffs of cloud chased across it by a light wind. Sitting in the pub garden at a table in the shade of a whispering beech tree with a bowl of soup, a chunk of crusty bread and a glass of lager, the world seemed a better place. Inevitably, the conversation moved immediately to Bea’s own life. As usual, her mother could be relied upon to put her mind to good use when listening to Bea, helping her to get matters into some sort of perspective.

      Although she was of the generation of middle-class wives whose pregnancy had put an end to their ambition and who had stayed at home to bring up their children, Adele was an intelligent woman, whose husband had trusted her good sense when he had had to make his own business decisions. She had known exactly how his bank functioned, who worked there and what they did or didn’t contribute and how he was able to manipulate them to his success.