The Afternoon Tea Club
JANE GILLEY

Published by AVON

A Division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2019

Copyright © Jane Gilley 2019

Cover design by Ellie Game © HarperCollinsPublishers 2019

Cover illustrations © Shutterstock

Jane Gilley asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © December 2019; ISBN: 9780008308643

Version: 2020-01-22

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

About the Publisher

Chapter 1

It was a hot muggy Saturday afternoon towards the end of June, as the scrabble of elderly ladies, a couple of elderly gents and a few younger people ambled through the double doors of Borough Community Centre, looking around themselves at the bright, modern, carpeted reception. Some of them were moaning about missing their afternoon TV programmes; some were asking questions of each other; some stared wide-eyed at the unfamiliar building, probably wondering why their families had left them here, even though it was, supposedly, to have afternoon tea with like-minded people.

Families had dropped off ageing mothers and reluctant aunts. Some of the elderly women wanted their loved ones to come inside with them. However, Marjorie could see the families were keen to leave their aged relatives at the community centre entrance.

‘Just go inside, Amelia,’ said one family member, firmly, to a small wizened lady in a turquoise, hand-embroidered shawl.

‘Goodness, Mum, you’re going to have a lovely time in there. We’ll see you later,’ said another family member, slamming the car door – almost before they’d finished speaking.

Another lady was chatting to her elderly relative and then turned to leave. ‘View it as a new adventure, Auntie Mavis! What’ve you got to lose? It could be great fun. I’ll see you back here afterwards. Ta-ra!’

None of them stayed with their relatives to help them settle into their new experience, which was beckoning just beyond the entrance of the community centre doors.

Bit of time out for the families, Marjorie thought to herself, following the other people into the building. Gracie had offered to stay, after she dropped her mother off, but Marjorie had said no.

Being dropped off by her daughter reminded her of the day she’d taken Gracie to school for the first time. She’d been dreading it all night. Oliver had said he wasn’t interested in ‘all that’ and said she could take Gracie by herself, which she’d preferred to do anyway. But she’d had a sinking feeling when she’d left Gracie whimpering at the school gates, her hand in that of a kindly teacher who’d said, ‘Please don’t worry, Mrs Sykes. She’ll be safe and cared for here.’

Oh, Marjorie had known full well that Gracie would be much better off at school than in the awful atmosphere at home. But her worry, back then, had not only been due to the fact that she couldn’t bear to be parted from her beloved only child all day and every day. More worrying to Marjorie had been the knowledge that because she didn’t work and Oliver was at home all day long with back problems, she’d have to contend with his exacting rages whenever he felt like it!

‘Hello, ladies, gents! Welcome to Borough Community Centre!’ the young receptionist said cheerily and then proceeded to chat about the lovely weather they were having, as she guided the cautious groups of people down the corridor towards the main hall.

Perhaps they don’t get out much either, thought Marjorie, walking alongside them. She spotted Mrs Lambert from the ground-floor flat, in the block where she lived with Gracie. She’d never considered that so many other elderly people would feel as lonely as her. She imagined old folk with grandchildren to be amongst the luckiest people in the world. Mrs Lambert had grandchildren. Yet here she was at an afternoon tea party for the lonely; the fed-up; the neglected. At least, that’s what Marjorie read into the leaflet that had flopped through the letterbox and was snatched up by Gracie.

A gleam had come into her daughter’s eye.

‘Talking of getting you out and about more, Mum …’ she’d begun in a tone she usually reserved for meaningful chats with the schoolchildren she taught. ‘Here! Look at this!’

So Marjorie followed the receptionist, alongside a swarm of mainly bowed grey heads in drab or worn jackets or rain macs, even though it was a clammily hot day. Their questions subsided as they seemed to accept their forced afternoon out. Marjorie passed a young woman with a black and white cat brooch on her rather oversized bright yellow cardigan, with matching Alice band. She looked familiar but Marjorie couldn’t think from where. Another lady was still wearing her sun hat, as they all shuffled into the hall towards a couple of nodding women, welcoming them with beaming smiles and wide-open arms. One of these women looked to be solidly middle-aged, wearing a pale blue cotton summer dress with capped sleeves and a badge in the middle of her chest that read: Eileen. The younger woman’s badge said, Taynor.

‘Ladies and, oh hello, gentlemen! Welcome! Welcome! Please come in and help yourselves to refreshments. Yes, come on in. Yes, just help yourselves. Then just take a seat at the tables, anywhere you fancy. Oh no, you don’t have to worry about all that, it’s totally free. No, you won’t need your purses; you don’t have to pay a penny! You’re just here to enjoy yourselves!’

A long table down one side of the hall was covered with white cups upside down on saucers, dishes of sugar lumps, small porcelain jugs of cold milk, huge plates of Crawford’s Rover biscuits and homemade Victoria sponge cakes with fondant icing. Three middle-aged women stood behind the table, wearing white aprons, asking the guests whether they wanted tea or coffee and encouraging them to help themselves to whichever biscuits or cake they wished. Marjorie couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen anyone wearing an apron. Or was it on one of those cooking programmes?

Marjorie noticed how the sight of cakes and biscuits soon perked everyone up, including herself. They all chuckled and marvelled at the sight of so much free food! And this small indulgence then gave them reason enough to happily gabble to each other about what was on offer at the community centre today and how nice the weather was and, ‘Oh, I do like that necklace of yours!’ or ‘Well, isn’t this lovely!’ even though they didn’t know each other.

Looking around her and wondering where to sit, Marjorie saw oblong tables set out for eight occupants. The chairs looked comfortable enough but the disposable paper tablecloths creased and moved as she tried to position herself at the table without spilling her tea or dropping her cake. A little lacking, Marjorie thought dimly.

Pleasant, soothing background music was filtering into the hall from somewhere, which created a lovely restful ambience. Yet as the guests were finishing off their refreshments, the commotion of chatter having died down, Marjorie could see they weren’t entirely comfortable with their surroundings, even though it was a rather nice place. Marjorie hadn’t made up her mind about this new environment yet. But to avoid confrontation with her daughter, earlier, she’d relented about coming along to sample the afternoon tea outing at Gracie’s insistence. She’d do it the once, just to say she’d tried it. Plus, if it didn’t work out, that would be the benchmark by which all other suggestions her daughter made would be met with understandable resistance. Marjorie wondered if the other old dears had arrived today under the same circumstances: unhappy with their lot but equally unhappy to have to make any positive changes for themselves, unless somebody else initiated that change for them.

As Marjorie sipped her second cup of hot tea, she could see that most of the women looked quite thin or perhaps they didn’t eat well enough. It was easy to think you didn’t need to eat so much when you were elderly and sitting around most of the day. Or perhaps they couldn’t afford to eat well. A few had walking frames or walking sticks and one younger lady was in a wheelchair. Apart from the youngish girl in the yellow cardigan and the cat brooch, who Marjorie couldn’t place but who sat at her table, Marjorie felt sorry for these other women. ‘Everyone has their crosses to bear,’ her best friend, Lou, always said.

The servers were still coming around the tables, asking if anyone would like refills or more cake, when the two ladies who Marjorie believed to be the organisers stood at the front of the ensemble and coughed to clear their throats.

‘Well, we must say we’re absolutely delighted to see that so many of you have made the effort to come along to our afternoon tea party today. And we hope you’re enjoying your refreshments. Mrs Spence, in charge of the servers at the back, there, made the cakes, which I’m sure you’ll all agree are rather yummy!’

A few people looked up, realising someone was speaking.

‘Eh? What did she say?’ said someone.

‘Shh! They’re saying something!’ hissed someone else.

‘Right so, just to let you know, my name is Eileen and I work for a division of our local healthcare services. And the lady next to me, Taynor, is my amazing assistant. It was at my mother’s suggestion that we organised this event because she told me she is always loneliest in the afternoons when, she said, it can be soul-destroying with nothing useful or meaningful to do. Does anyone else, here, ever feel like this sometimes?’ Eileen asked, pausing to glance around at her audience.

Some of the people in the room were fidgeting now or still chatting; some were burrowing around in their bags, some were half listening but more anxious to finish their cake. It seemed to dawn on them – rather slowly – that something was being asked of them. Eileen waited patiently. A few people murmured inaudible responses.

‘Well, folks,’ Eileen tried again. ‘I’m just telling you about my situation at home with my mother. I must say, I never suspected that my mother was bored, or fed up and felt that she wasn’t needed any more. But she said everyone feels like this from time to time. So it’s been a bit of a revelation to me that people who are retired or elderly or people otherwise in a position where they are at home all day long, like carers, often feel like this. I think my mother initially held back from admitting this to me because she thought I’d be upset to realise that the rest of my family and I were partly to blame for her discomfort. I have to admit, I was gutted. And very apologetic too, I might add! My family and I actually live with my mum in her house and yet we never allowed her to help out around the home, even when she wanted to. “Just rest up,” I’d say to her. “You’ve worked hard all your life.” I mean for one thing she’s in a wheelchair now and I guess we thought that was reason enough to assume she’d just want peace and quiet at this time of her life. “Not so,” she told me huffily. “I still need a reason to get up in a morning, whether I’m in a wheelchair or not,” she said. So we sat down together, as a family, and realised that apart from activities for residents in local nursing homes, there’s not an awful lot of meaningful activities for our ageing or housebound citizens to do on a regular basis, to prevent them from feeling lonely or bored at home. I mean, we’re well served by the nursing and health community but there’s nothing much that’s activity-based. Would any of you agree with this statement? However, there has been talk and a bit of a national push about offering more stimulating activities to people who are not otherwise engaged in an ordinary working life and in some parts of the country localised organisations have already made a good start with this. Unfortunately, our area hasn’t really jumped on that bandwagon yet. So we’re starting to look at this now.’

The fidgeting had stopped. All faces had turned to study the two ladies in front of them. Was something actually being asked of them? One of the elderly gentlemen, seated at the back said: ‘Hear, hear, ladies. Yes, it can be very quiet and lonely in the afternoons. I think this is a grand idea of your mother’s. I, for one, would definitely come along again if you’re going to be doing this on a more regular basis? Is that what you’re saying?’

Eileen nodded.

‘It certainly is. And this idea of my mother’s is part of it. So, following on from the conversation with my mother, I suggested to my bosses at work that if we trialled something like this – an afternoon out with a cuppa or two – and if our community welcomed it, we could start to do more things like this on a regular basis. It’s Taynor’s and my long-term ideal, you see, to help our ageing or homebound community make the most of life. So the point of today’s afternoon tea is to inspire you to mix with people you may not have met before with a view to possibly forming new friendships. You see, we believe that once you start making new connections with each other – once you realise that what you feel and think is still important to us all – you’ll start to feel more valued within your own community. We’re sure you’ll agree that chatting and discussion creates camaraderie and a general feeling of wellbeing.’

‘Yes, there’s nothing like a cuppa and a good natter,’ someone said, laughing.

‘Exactly!’ Eileen agreed. ‘Being part of a social gathering generally makes people feel happier and accepted, doesn’t it? So we think a concept like this would help lift your spirits and give you a new purpose in life. Plus by engaging in some new activities and experiences you would also play your own part by contributing to the wellbeing of your community.’

Murmurs of approval and slow head-nodding began to weave around the tables.

‘So how else do we feel you could help your community?’ said Taynor, taking over from Eileen with an encouraging smile. ‘Well, following on from this initial idea, we’d then hope to get your feedback about new incentives to help enrich the lives of yourselves and those around you. This would be your chance to help us compile a document to present to our bosses about the needs of our elderly and housebound community. We’d need signatures from all your family and friends to give this project enough clout to resonate and make a real difference to all our lives. In other words, your opinion is being sought with a view to make positive changes within our community. How does that sound to you all?’

A ripple of surprise ran around the community centre. Marjorie wasn’t the only one to realise that she and Gracie hadn’t read the flyer correctly. Wasn’t this meant to be a simple afternoon out, for afternoon tea, no strings attached? Taynor sounded like a political canvasser, touting for votes. But, golly, this was better than that kind of politics. Eileen and Taynor actually wanted them to join in and contribute to the society they lived in. Well, that was a first! The amount of times she’d have liked to have got on her soapbox and crow to anyone who’d listen about everything she thought was wrong with society today! And yet here she was now. Here they all were now, being invited to set the stage for the ‘greater good’.

‘Well, that’s a marvellous idea,’ said the elderly gent who had already spoken, intruding on the whispered confusion of the others. ‘I’m all for it!’

‘But would these afternoons stop then, after you got your, um, your data or whatever?’ asked a canny younger lady, dressed in a pale grey trouser suit.

Eileen stepped forward to speak again.

‘Not at all. As long as yourselves, as a community, want afternoons out, we hope to continue providing them. We’d also like suggestions as to what other activities you’d like to participate in. You know, things like a weekly art class or a drive out for the day. Activities like that. Of course, as you get to know each other you can start arranging your own afternoons out if you wish or you could start forming your own clubs and organisations. We’re simply here to start the ball rolling, as it were, to help you help yourselves in order to improve your lives and give you your own voice within our community. We want to help you realise that, no matter what your age or circumstances, you do still count.’

Marjorie noticed the shift from complacency to murmurs of ‘Oh right,’ or ‘Well, that would be rather nice for a change.’ People were starting to put their hands up to ask further questions. How often did anyone ask the elderly what they thought about anything? As far as she was aware, there were plenty of activities for youngsters but Marjorie had never heard of any such events for anyone of her own age. Or perhaps there were things advertised in the daily newspapers? But she only read the Sunday papers and hadn’t noticed anything like that in there and, as for things online, well, she couldn’t even use a computer, despite Gracie saying she’d help her with that. Yet it actually felt marvellous to be permitted to stand up and be counted, for once! Oliver had never let her have her own opinions. She had never been allowed to voice her concerns nor her wishes in his presence. So being given consent to stand up and say something meaningful would be quite splendid.

‘Can we tell our friends about this scheme? I think my friend Elsa would love to go for a drive somewhere. She’s housebound at the moment,’ said the girl in the yellow cardigan.

‘Yes, of course,’ said Taynor. ‘We’d like to get the community involved as much as possible. We’re here to hear what you have to say and then act upon it. All suggestions very welcome. Right, so we’d like you to have a think about what activities you’d like to do and if you decide to come back next week could you write out your ideas and put them in our suggestion box? We’ll put the box at the side here, by the table, next week. Then we can discuss it all the following week, when we’ve read through what you’ve got to say. Oh yes – sorry – I forgot to tell you, we’re going to be here next week as well, so do please come back and have afternoon tea with us again – same time, same place – and bring any friends along who might be lonely or a bit fed up or whatever. We’ll also collate some name stickers next week for you to wear, which will make it a whole lot easier to remember each other’s names. So now we just need to ask if you’ve enjoyed this afternoon? Oh and I need to let you know that we might have to change the venue in the future, depending what’s in the bookings diary here, but if that’s the case we’ll let you know in advance. So now I also need to ask you, if you could and if you want to, please give us your contact details, before you leave, in case we need to cancel next week’s tea or let you know anything else.’

‘Right! So if none of you have any further questions, we’ll just say, thank you for coming along today. We hope you’ve enjoyed it and we hope to see you next week,’ said Eileen, with a slight bow.

Everybody started to clap. The tables of elderly women and the gents were quite animated by now, discussing the fact they were to be part of something – ahem – meaningful, and a social experiment, no less! Marjorie marvelled at the fact that Eileen and Taynor had managed to get an unrelated group of people, chatting freely together as if they’d known each other all their lives.

But best of all, Marjorie noticed, it had established the buzz of a sudden sense of, yes, pride in the room. Were the grey heads really starting to sit up and feel counted?

Marjorie liked that feeling, herself, too. So, yes, she might come back next week. She hadn’t intended to at the outset; she’d just been doing it to appease Gracie. But now she might ask Lou if she wanted to come. Perhaps Gracie would even pick Lou up and drive them both here. Lou would love it here as she always had plenty to say about everything. Marjorie smiled at that thought.

Oh well, it took all sorts to make a good pie!

Chapter 2

The idea of afternoon tea with a group of total strangers had not, initially, sat well with Marjorie Sykes.

‘When you reach a certain age,’ she’d told her daughter, Gracie, ‘you only really want close friends and family around you.’

But following her discussion with Gracie, when the flyer about afternoon tea at the community centre had landed on their doormat, and the subsequent afternoon tea meeting, she was now – surprisingly – warming to the idea.

She’d shared Gracie’s flat with her for the last four years, and that had been lovely, of course, but forays out with her daughter or anyone else for that matter were sporadic. Her remaining friends were thin on the ground for one reason or another – mainly due to Oliver – or now lived elsewhere and Gracie was often shattered when she came back from work at night, after her train then bus journey from the out-of-town secondary school where she taught English. So Marjorie had very little interaction with anyone on a regular basis, apart from the man in the corner shop or the postman or occasional visits to see her doctor.

Her only child, Gracie, slim with a blonde bob, was the apple of her eye. She’d recently won an award from her pupils where she taught, who were encouraged to vote for the best teacher in their school each year. ‘It’s a new in-house award, following that incident last year when that boy attacked one of the tutors,’ Gracie had explained to her mother. ‘It’s the Head’s latest idea to help improve relationships between the staff and students. The children vote on three categories: respect, approachability and clarity of instruction. It’s supposed to make the kids think about the role of a school tutor in their lives; and for us, it highlights any grey areas where we should be making improvements.’ Gracie possessed a certain calm and poise and knew how to mete out the right degree of encouragement to her students, concentrating on their positive attributes rather than the negative, in order to encourage rather than discourage. Her approach had clearly earned the children’s hearts.

Yet, her daughter’s marvellous achievements aside, Marjorie was miffed to note that Gracie was being decidedly pushy, these days, about her mother needing to do something meaningful with her life instead of ‘moping around all day’.

Admittedly, helping Gracie with the shopping, cleaning and washing took care of morning duties, but – apart from daytime TV – what was there to actually do during the long tedious hours until bedtime? She daren’t admit to her daughter that most afternoons she simply sat on the sofa ploughing her way through books she’d acquired from the library because there really wasn’t much else to occupy her time.

‘Why don’t you go do some voluntary work, Mum? Or help an elderly person with their cleaning or something?’ Gracie encouraged, when her mother had moaned about the lack of activities during the afternoon.

But she was eighty-two, for God’s sake! Not some idle teenager being encouraged that there was more to life than being ‘poked’ or snap-chatted by all her friends or whatever the latest devices-related craze was. Didn’t the years of bringing up a family entitle her to a bit of peace, now she was old, craggy and tired? In the mirror, a grey-haired lady with a plethora of facial lines, born from far too much angst, stared back at her. Even with make-up, she looked tired.

That said, no one had told Marjorie about the inevitable boring bits she’d duly experience as she got older – especially the hardly-anything-to-do-all-day bit. And she didn’t want to admit that sometimes she felt like screaming, trying to think up new things to do every single day. That was tiring enough in itself! Yet she realised having nothing meaningful to do on a daily basis had made her withdraw from life. Sometimes she paced the flat; sometimes she could only bring herself to stare out the window, arms folded, at the communal patio, watching the birds pecking at seed on the bird table she’d bought and set up, mainly to give herself something to look at when she had nothing better to do. Oh, she’d been thrilled when the other residents had congratulated her for that. But even though she was thoroughly fed up with things at the moment she certainly knew she didn’t need another ‘Life Goal’ at her age.

‘Besides, I still have a few friends, as you well know, daughter dear.’

However, it did irk Marjorie that the few friends she had left were all occupied by grandchildren or great-grandchildren and didn’t see her very often. And being as Gracie was divorced with no little ones to occupy Marjorie’s time, she couldn’t even fulfil her own longed-for role as a grandmother. Marjorie often remarked that it was ‘High time you got married again, Gracie dear, and gave me grandchildren! You’re in your late forties now, sweetheart. No time to waste!’

And then their conversations would turn into a testy argument, with Marjorie wagging an index finger and Gracie insisting that since the collapse of her marriage – not due to them being childless, but because Harry had gone off with some ‘young thing’, as Marjorie put it – she’d wanted nothing more to do with men.

‘I’m loving all this free time by myself, Mother. I can do what I want, when I want, which is great. Thought you – of all people – would understand that? I tried pandering to Harry’s every need and where did that get me, huh? Still went off with someone else! What is it with you and I, picking the wrong men all the time?’

Marjorie had sighed.

So, no grandchildren for her, then. No rocking babies gently to sleep. No fun days out with tantrums in the park about whose turn it was on the swings. Nope! A life of solitary confinement, occasionally seeing friends whose lives weren’t embossed with the embroilment of family life, was her luck of the draw.

Thus Marjorie’s life, when she wasn’t moping around the house, consisted of occasional visits to the library to borrow and return books, just to give her a reason to get out of the house; or occasional walks in the park with Gracie, providing her daughter was free on a weekend; or taking her oldest and best friend Lou to the chiropodist, to get her toenails cut; but no excursions to get a nice cup of tea somewhere afterwards. So it was far from an exciting existence and, yes, she conceded privately, Gracie was right; it was aimless at best, pointless at worst.

Living with her daughter hadn’t turned out to be full of the promise she’d expected. But, tedium aside, Marjorie knew it was infinitely better than living by herself after Oliver died.

And thank the Lord he had!

Just as well he’d had his stroke because Marjorie couldn’t think of any new ideas about how she could possibly get rid of him, without getting the blame!

Yes, that sounded bad. But Marjorie’s husband Oliver had been a bully, both emotionally and physically, for most of their married life. Marjorie couldn’t remember when it had first started. Possibly it had begun when he’d left the army ‘under a cloud’. He’d been very morose around that time. But each subsequent job hadn’t worked out for him, either. Not that Marjorie was making excuses for him, but she belonged to an era that truly believed in their ‘for better or worse’ vows.

Yet excuses aside, he’d hit her a lot. Oh, he’d been very apologetic at first, which had sucked her in, believing him to be remorseful. But it had continued. Thrice she’d been to hospital; once for concussion, once for a broken arm, once for her miscarriage due to his aggression. He’d become increasingly abusive after Gracie was born because he couldn’t stand the fact that – suddenly – all Marjorie’s attention was poured onto their new-born child.

‘There are three of us in this relationship. Not just you and ruddy Gracie! Remember that, woman. Now go get me my dinner before I really lose it with you!’

Fortuitously he’d never laid a finger on Gracie. Marjorie knew she’d have had to leave if he’d done that. But when she’d turned to her mother for moral support and advice, her mother had shaken her head. Unfortunately, she was one of those women who considered it wrong to interfere in another person’s relationship, whatever the circumstances.

‘Yer makes yer bed, yer lies in it!’ was her comment when Marjorie turned up, the first time it happened, to discuss Oliver’s behaviour.

Another time, when she’d had her mother around for Sunday lunch – hoping for once that Oliver wouldn’t let himself down in front of them – the meal had started off okay, until Oliver mentioned the fact that Marjorie had bought him the wrong shaving gel that morning. As Oliver raged, Marjorie had overheard her mother calmly tell Gracie, ‘Just leave them to it, lovey.’

Marjorie had no siblings and wasn’t sure what response she’d get if she offloaded to her friends. She knew everyone had their own problems and where could she have gone for respite with a young child in those days? So she put up with their situation and suffered in silence.

However, Marjorie had been mortified when Gracie told her mother, on her eighteenth birthday, that she intended to leave home and go travelling for a year with friends.

‘Oh but, Gracie, you can’t just leave! You’re my life!’

‘Well, I know that, Mum. But I need some time out on my own – everyone’s doing it before college or university! Besides, if I’m being really honest, I, um, I just can’t stand being here any longer. I can’t tolerate the awfulness of things any more. There’s really no reason for you to continually suffer at the hand of Daddy. Why don’t you leave him? Or ring the police? Or you could go and live somewhere else? Anyway, me and my mate, Rosa, will probably go and look for work in London, afterwards, because anywhere’s better than being here!’

‘But, Gracie, you can’t leave. What about your education?’

‘It can wait, Mum. Other students have time out and this is no different. Besides, I really think you should do something about Daddy.’

But Marjorie had always been frightened of Oliver and simply didn’t know what to do. And even if she had told someone about her troubles with him, would they have wanted to get involved in all that? She suspected they’d have told her to leave him. But she was a housewife and funds were limited at best. She had no access to surplus money in order to move away, so she’d felt trapped.

Gracie had never understood the reasoning behind her father’s venom. Weren’t you supposed to have loving, caring parents around you as you grew up? She’d tried to intervene once, standing between her beloved mother and crazed father. But she’d got a furious verbal diatribe from him. He hadn’t hit her but he’d sworn and yelled loudly enough to warn her off interfering again. And he’d also frightened their friends away over the years when they’d rung – often by brusquely telling them Marjorie or Gracie were out. So they’d stopped ringing. At school, Gracie had tried to explain to her friends what was going on at home.

‘He’s completely unreasonable, so never call me at home, okay? It’s too risky. We’ll make plans for the weekend here at school instead.’

Marjorie had been so wrapped up in avoiding Oliver’s fury or trying to placate him that she’d forgotten what kind of impact it might have been having on their young daughter. The result of which was that her darling Gracie wanted to leave home. Yet why should Gracie suffer the consequences of her father’s actions?

‘Oh, darling, I’m so sorry it’s come to this,’ Marjorie had said, sobbing, as the reality of Gracie’s words hit home. ‘I know I should’ve sorted it all out, somehow, years ago. But I’ve never really known what to do about your father. Look, please stay. We’ll work something out, Gracie. Please don’t go, sweetheart. Oh, I couldn’t bear it if you left!’

But Gracie had stood her ground.

‘It’s not your fault, Mother. He’s unresponsive to reason. It’s domestic violence, pure and simple. He’s a wife-beater and it’s a criminal offence. There’s no other way to dress it up. So I can’t stay. I can’t stand seeing what he does to you every day and feeling helpless about what to do. It’s not right. You should report him, even though I know you’re scared. Anyway, my leaving will help – I know he didn’t want me so that makes me part of the problem.’

‘Gracie, none of this is about you!’ Marjorie had pleaded. ‘Are you listening to me? None of it. It’s his doing. He’s the problem. Good God, I should never have let it get this far. But I thought I was dealing with it in my own way. Darling, please! I’m so sorry it’s come to this.’

‘I know you’re sorry, Mum, and I just wish I could make it all better for you but nothing I say makes any difference. It still goes on. Anyway, my friends have booked the trip now, so I’m sorry to disappoint you but I’m … I’m going.’

Marjorie knew she had to concede to her daughter’s wishes. But she daren’t tell Oliver. And so one morning, before Oliver was awake, she smuggled Gracie away to the bus stop. Time away from the family would probably be good for Gracie. She was young; she had prospects and her own life to lead. Marjorie knew she couldn’t hold her back indefinitely, even though she secretly wanted to hold on to her forever. And then, needing someone to tell, she’d gone round and offloaded to her best friend, Lou, sobbing remorsefully on her lap, whilst Lou had patted her friend’s head.

‘Oh, I thought summat was amiss with Oliver. I’d heard talk. And your poor girl. But you can’t be standing for all that nonsense, love. Tell him I’ll send my son Derek round if he comes for yer again!’

But Marjorie was convinced things would only get worse for her if she tried that suggestion. Instead, she found the courage to secretly buy a pay-as-you-go mobile phone, so she could ring Lou privately when things got too bad. Unfortunately, Oliver found it and smashed it to smithereens and then punished her.

‘You’ll not be going behind my back and gossiping with your friends about me!’ he’d shouted at her, as Marjorie cowered in a corner, quietly sobbing.

He’d once, laughingly, justified his treatment of Marjorie to their friends, on an impromptu night out. They hadn’t known what was going on until then. ‘A good beating is all these women understand!’ He’d smirked at their shocked faces.

Oliver’s temper had continued to simmer under the surface until Gracie got married and moved to Dorset. Gracie’s husband, Harry, was a police officer, but he’d told Gracie there was nothing anyone could really do unless her mother made a formal complaint or someone saw her bruises. So Gracie persuaded her mother to wear a light sleeveless summer top at their next summer barbecue and then, when Harry finally saw the bruises for himself that day, he stepped in to have a serious word.

‘Fuck’s going on, Oliver? What’s this all about? If I ever see anything else like this again or if I bloody well even hear about it, I’m doin’ you! So think on, mate!’

Outraged, Oliver had then been careful to hit Marjorie where the bruises weren’t so easily spotted! But the frequency, Marjorie was relieved to note, dissipated.

After Gracie divorced Harry for his infidelities and rented a flat, back where Marjorie and Oliver lived in Hampshire, Gracie hoped she’d finally be able to help her mother, providing she could persuade her to be helped.

‘You’ve got to leave him, Mum. Look, why don’t you come and live with me, now I’m on my own? I’ve got the two bedrooms so we can have one each. It’d be nice to have some company for a change and we get on well enough, you and I, don’t we? We could have days out and, well, I just think it would be lovely for us both,’ Gracie had said.

It had sounded like a heavenly idea to Marjorie.

‘Well, I’d like to leave, Gracie, but to be honest I’m frightened of him. What if he made life even more unbearable for us, in some way? Besides I don’t want to involve you in all of that again. At least it’s not as bad as it used to be. Anyway, darling, you deserve a happier life now you’re free from Harry and you’ve got some lovely friends and a good job at the school. I know you mean well, sweetie, but I’ll be okay. I’ve survived this long, haven’t I?’

To herself, when she was alone, polishing and cleaning the house the way Oliver liked it or when he was down the pub, drinking heavily and playing snooker with his old army mates, Marjorie used to think, Why are we still together if you don’t love me? Divorce might have been an option for some people but she knew Oliver would never grant her one and she wouldn’t have wanted one anyway. So, mostly, she just wished he was dead.

And then he did die.

He died one Sunday morning sitting at the table, chewing his toast, waiting for his bacon and eggs, banging on the table with the handle of his knife, making dents in the table top.

‘Where’s my bloody breakfast?’ he’d called from the dining room. ‘And if you don’t hurry up – aargh! Wha’s happenin’ to me? Marj! Marj!’

Hearing the change in his tone from anger to panic, Marjorie had rushed into the dining room and then stopped, realising exactly what was happening. Her father had died from a stroke too. They told you the signs to watch out for on the telly. She watched in disbelief as her husband slid from the table onto the floor; his right hand hooked like a claw, reaching out to her in his last gesture of anger.

‘Do something, b-bitch!’

But something snapped in Marjorie at that moment. How dare he!

How absolutely dare he speak to her like that! She’d given him her life and he’d trodden all over it. His awfulness had even sent Gracie out of their door. And this was how he was treating her, even now? She’d been totally prepared to help him, until that point, despite the relentless abuse he’d inflicted on her.

Instead, she took a deep breath and folded her arms. She would help him – she’d be his wife to the bitter end, as per her wedding vows – but she had something to say to him first.

‘It serves you right, you old bastard!’ she said, exuberantly.

She saw one of Oliver’s eyebrows flick up in surprise; she’d never dared answer him back before.

‘Do you realise what you’ve done to us, over all these years? Did you enjoy inflicting all that pain? Did it make you feel more worthy as a man?’

He didn’t answer. His eyebrow dropped; his eyes stared out in front of him.

She was aware of the tick, tick, ticking of the dining room clock, as she waited for an answer. She even thought at the very least he might say, ‘I’m sorry, love.’ How very different their lives might have been, if he hadn’t been such a beast of a man! How very different their days might have been, if he’d been kind, instead of forcing his wife and daughter to walk on eggshells, fearful of what he might do or say to them next!

Why wouldn’t he answer her? Clearly he wasn’t remorseful in the slightest about the way he’d treated her over the years!

With a sigh, she turned to ring the doctor.

‘Well, he’s gone all red like he’s choking or something. But I don’t, um, I don’t know how to dislodge anything if it’s stuck, you see. Well no. We’re old folks, love, and I wouldn’t be able to do anything like that. The – the what did you call it? The something thrust? No, I don’t know how to do it, love,’ Marjorie replied to the doctor’s receptionist. ‘Yes, I think he was eating some toast. I tried banging on his back but nothing’s come out. Oh, wait a minute. Oh, gosh! Oh, now it looks like he’s not breathing. So shall I, um, shall I ring the ambulance instead?’

Chapter 3

Stacy was soaked from the hefty downpour by the time she got back to her flat, following afternoon tea at the community centre. She stood dripping on the doormat; her yellow cardigan now soaked with cold rain. She’d forgotten her umbrella and it had rained in heavy blobs, despite the heat. She hated her hair getting wet because it expanded, uncontrollably, into a frizzy mess if she let it. That’s why she’d kept it long, a bit too long really, in the hope the weight would keep it down. It didn’t make much difference though. Her clothes needed to go straight into a washing machine, but she didn’t have one. She always did her washing at the laundrette next to the corner shop, so her clothes would have to wait in the washbag until she got around to doing that. The first thing she wanted to do, however, was have a shower, to wash away the stickiness from choosing the right colour but wrong fabric for her afternoon tea outfit. She didn’t actually have any going-out outfits because she never normally went anywhere.

She felt quite relieved to be home, but as she turned the key in her door she was greeted with a cacophony of pitiful mews and yowling. It sounded a little different to usual. As she entered her flat a black and white cat slouched from behind the kitchen door and wound itself around her ankles, staring wistfully up at her with its lovely yellow eyes. Stacy bent down to stroke it.

‘Oh, Pooch, my little pretty,’ she murmured, picking it up and kissing its face. But the cat suddenly struck out a paw and clawed the side of her face.

‘Ow! Naughty Pooch!’ she exclaimed, dropping the cat, which ran off with a howl. ‘Bad kitty!’

Stacy stomped along the corridor to the bathroom, holding her face. She glanced in the mirror. It was only a little nick but it had left a spotted trail of blood, sliding towards her chin. She dabbed at the blood with some toilet paper. Pooch probably hadn’t meant it. He’d be skulking in the lounge now, fearful of another telling-off. But she had to get her wet clothes off first and get sorted.

However, turning from the sink, she could see some of her other cats – Ebony, Chater, Melanie and Dingle – leaping around in the bath playing with the shower extension. They were having fun. She didn’t particularly want to disturb them. But then she breathed in smells she didn’t really want to smell, either. One of them had probably weed and they were all in it now. Damn. The bath would need cleaning before she got in and used the shower attachment. But Chater was currently problematic and skittish following the incident with the toilet lid falling on him yesterday. Maybe shooing them out of the bathroom wouldn’t go down too well with him at the moment, either. She certainly didn’t want him hissing and clawing her again this afternoon.

Sighing, Stacy took her cardigan off and dropped it by the sink. She needed to see if Snowball looked any better. But the yowling was louder in the lounge when she opened the door. She sidestepped their climbing frames and empty tins of cat food, overflowing litter trays and unfortunate ‘accidents’ all over the lounge carpet. It really needed cleaning in here. John, her next-door neighbour often banged on her door to complain about the noise and smell. How, she wondered, could he possibly smell anything when they lived in separate flats? He was such a Moaning Minnie!

‘Snowball, my little – oh! Snowball!’

Stacy gently picked up the tiny limp body from beside the radiator and held it like a baby in her arms. A tear slid down her cheek and plopped onto the little lifeless black kitten.

Casper tried to jump on her lap and sniff Snowball as she sat down on the sofa. She pushed him off. But he jumped back on again. So, that’s why they’re concerned, Stacy thought.

But what should she do now? She knew she had to get the kitten out of the flat. Maybe the odd-sounding mewing would stop then. She’d have to find a sealed plastic container to put him in, ready for burying somewhere. That would probably calm the others, too, she thought. Their mewing was constant. If only she could switch that noise off, sometimes! She needed her shower, yes, but her priority was to get Snowball away from the others because she could see the tiny kitten looked somewhat scraggy and when she turned him over – oh no – he’d been mauled!

She went into the kitchen, stepping over Rover the ginger tom – narrowly missing treading on Canterbury her pregnant cat. How had Canterbury got out of the bedroom? Had she left the door open, by mistake? And was Rover bothering Canterbury now?

‘For God’s sake, guys!’

She pushed Canterbury along the corridor with her foot, as gently as she could, and finally got her pregnant cat back inside the bedroom. But she’d had to put Snowball on the floor whilst she kept Canterbury just inside the bedroom door, with one hand, and then shut the bedroom door with her other. Unfortunately – quick as a whip – Rover spotted Snowball and went to paw him.

‘Stop it, Rover! Was that you before? Get into the lounge! Now stay in there, naughty boy!’

Stacy was always stressed with the effort of trying to keep them all separated or stopping fights. She often got badly scratched for her efforts. It was partly the reason she always wore long-sleeved clothes, even in the summer; to cover her unsightly sores! She realised keeping all the cats in her one-bedroom flat had probably not been her best idea. And whilst she knew that cats tended to grieve a dead companion, both Rover and Chater had become unpredictable animals of late. Probably being cooped up in her small home meant their behaviours weren’t as they should be. Yet her obsession with cats hadn’t started off like this.

Stacy loved cats. They were her kind of animal. They weren’t as needy as dogs, even though she knew dogs were loyal. As a child she’d lived on a farm with her parents and brother, so she was used to animals. However, the cats her father had kept were for ratting only. She’d never been encouraged to pet them, although she had done sometimes.

‘Never know what germs they carry, so leave them be,’ her father used to say.

So it was a complete joy to her when she was able to leave home and buy this flat with her half of her grandmother’s inheritance. Having her own place meant living by her own rules and also meant she could have as many cats as she liked! So she’d started off by buying a couple of kittens from a pet shop. Then people had wanted her to take their cats when they moved house or if someone found a stray. She knew about the Cats Protection society but they always seemed to be terribly busy with their own intakes. So Stacy had thought she was helping everybody out by taking cats in herself.

Trouble was, working every day in the library meant she could only see them lunchtimes and evenings, and so she’d often come home to find chunks out of them when they’d been fighting and once one got stuck behind the back of the kitchen units, which had meant getting someone to remove the unit and rescue the cat. So vet bills were fairly high because she was at the vets quite a lot. Yet she still hadn’t got round to sorting out a pet plan for them all yet.

Some days it felt like she was fighting a losing battle, trying to keep them all alive and happy and fed or separating them into the various rooms. And trying to find out who got on best with who was always a worry with new cats. Occasionally she found them new homes but not often. She’d had most of her current cats for nearly two years now – Snowball had been a new addition. Yet, despite their traits, despite being problematic, she loved them all dearly. It was wearing though. But she couldn’t simply give them all away! Who would look after them like she did? Who else would spoil them with those little tins of sardines or smoked salmon, when she could afford it? Cat charities were probably overworked and no one else had the time to help her out.

Stacy didn’t mingle with anyone from work and really only had the one friend, Elsa, from primary school days, although she hadn’t seen her in ages. Elsa lived in the village Stacy was from and had been such a bright, happy girl, emerging from school with hordes of qualifications, destined for university and a life of amazing possibilities. But a skiing accident had taken all that away from her. Now she still lived at home, relying on her parents. Of course, they took her out in her wheelchair and looked after all her needs to the very best of their ability. But it was so sad. Elsa was the only friend Stacy had because all her time was taken up looking after her nine, no, eight cats and kittens. At least Elsa was usually in, when Stacy found the time to Skype, even though she hadn’t managed it in quite a while. In fact, Stacy hadn’t been back to visit Elsa nor her own parents for a good few years. She hadn’t learned how to drive, so it meant getting on and off the three buses it took, in order to visit them, which meant far too many hours away from the cats.

God, the place stank!

She knew she ought to get rid of the lounge carpet and buy laminate flooring. Much easier to clean, of course. Yet when did she have time to go shopping for new flooring? How could she make changes, in any respect, when she didn’t have the time to do that? The afternoon tea experience had been a bit of an experiment for her. She’d seen the flyer in the corner shop window and because she’d known it was only for an hour or so and, fortunately, nearby, she’d risked going. She hadn’t been anywhere in a long time, so it had been really nice talking to other people instead of trying to reason with her cats, for once. And the cake had been delicious! She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had nice cake. Her weekly shopping jaunts meant only going to the corner shop or next door to the laundrette, and buying local was a much quicker option than getting the bus to the supermarket and leaving all her cats for hours on end. Yet she’d have loved to go shopping at a supermarket – any supermarket – with all the mouth-watering offerings they had on display, at far more reasonable prices.

‘I need a shower,’ she said out loud, above the mewing.

But to do that she needed to get Melanie, Ebony, Dingle and Chater out of the bath and wash the bath down. She chewed her lip, knowing she’d come out of that scenario with more than a couple of bites and scratches. Fortunately, she kept a lot of disinfectant to hand.

She’d considered getting separate cat carriers to leave the cats in, when she went out. That way she could maybe spend a bit more time doing things she wanted to do. But she knew that was a horrid idea because then they’d be stuck in them most of the day while she was at work and wouldn’t be able to move around properly in them. So that’s why she gave them free rein of the flat. Or rather, free rein of whatever part of the flat she’d allocated them to.

No, there was no other choice. She’d simply have to keep doing what she’d been doing these last few years. No time for boyfriends, shopping or living. Just time to look after her poor little kitties.

Question was, who was going to look after her?

Chapter 4

It had been a week of thunderstorms and drizzle, since the last afternoon tea meeting at Borough Community Centre, and the ladies and gents and the few younger people slurping tea and munching biscuits around the tables at this week’s afternoon tea had been lamenting over that fact.

One lady had slipped in the doorway, due to the wet being traipsed in on people’s feet. She’d been helped up by a woman who she was delighted to recognise as being her long-lost childhood school friend from a neighbouring town.

‘Pauline? Pauline Rastock? Oh I don’t believe it!’

‘Goodness, is that you, Emily? Emily Blye? Well, what a coincidence!’

‘Small world! Look, let me help you. Oh, your foot looks quite swollen. Can you stand on it?’

‘No, not very well. It’s quite painful! Now how are we going to get into the hall with me like this?’

‘Right, well, just put your weight on me and we’ll hobble. Yes, that’s it. Let’s get a table together. It’ll be wonderful to catch up. Oh and I hear they’ve got chocolate cake this week.’

‘Chocolate cake? Gosh, we are being spoilt, aren’t we?’

Marjorie smiled as she passed the two enthusiastic ladies. People were making friends or rather reuniting with old friends. Unfortunately, Lou wasn’t well enough to make it this week but promised she’d come next week if Gracie would bring her. But Marjorie’s eyes lit up at the sound of chocolate cake being served this week. What a treat! She used to love baking but it tended to end up down a wall or trodden into her carpet when Oliver was alive. She shuddered at the thought of what she’d had to put up with throughout those awful years.

‘Have you put your suggestions in the box yet?’ said one of the elderly gents from last week. His question interrupted her thoughts, making her jump.

‘What? Oh no. I’m perfectly happy just coming here for afternoon tea. Especially as we’ve got chocolate cake this week.’

‘Ah yes.’ The gent smiled. ‘I can see everybody’s thrilled about that. Although I must say I prefer Victoria sandwich, myself. My name’s Raymond, by the way, like it says on my sticker. They wrote it out for me, which is helpful as I’ve got a bit of arthritis in my right hand, so I don’t tend to write much nowadays. They’re nice people, Eileen and Taynor, aren’t they? It’s marvellous what they’re trying to do for us, don’t you think? And I can’t wait to see what suggestions everybody comes up with next week. So where’s your sticker, then?’

‘Er, I might get one later, if I remember. I don’t think I’ll necessarily be coming all that often. Maybe occasionally.’

‘Ah,’ Raymond said. ‘Well, look. Do you mind if I join you at your table?’

Marjorie shook her head, although maybe a little too vigorously, and started to ramble.

‘Um, no you can’t join me. I don’t know where I’m sitting just yet and I was just about to try and find the toilet. Do you know where they are?’

‘Oh, I’m not sure. Maybe somewhere near reception?’

Marjorie sidled away. Oliver had always hated her talking to other men. Yet, despite him no longer being alive, she still couldn’t seem to get out of the habit of making her excuses and leaving men when they approached her. Gracie got mad about it sometimes.

‘I wish you’d see how rude it sounds to people when you’re abrupt like that. They’re not Daddy. So can’t you learn how to let them down more gently instead of just saying “no” to everyone? My God, you’re lucky to be approached at all. Some women never experience the charm of a man and there you are turning them away at eighty-two!’

Marjorie hated it when Gracie got angry with her but she could do nothing to change her behaviour. It was in-built from too many years of constant abuse. Even though Gracie had pulled her up about this unsavoury aspect of her personality and even though she’d tried to watch what she said to people, sometimes things just popped out unchecked. Unfortunately, it usually hit her that she was saying the wrong thing after she’d said it.

So she decided to stay in the toilets until she felt sure Raymond would have found a seat somewhere else. Then she went back and ordered tea and a piece of chocolate cake from the helpers.

‘Oh and here’s your name sticker. It’s Marjorie, isn’t it?’ said Eileen coming up to her.

Marjorie turned in puzzled surprise. She’d told no one her name.

‘The girl in the yellow cardigan, over there, overheard your daughter calling you Marjorie last week. Her name is Stacy,’ Eileen said.

‘Oh right. Thanks!’ Marjorie said, relieved, but then nearly jumped out of her skin as Eileen positioned the sticker just below Marjorie’s left shoulder and pressed lightly.

Marjorie already felt flustered by this week’s experiences in the community centre. And she felt out of sorts at Eileen’s easy manner as she stuck the name tag on her. Well, sure, Marjorie’s hands were full, so it made sense, and it had been done with care, but it made her realise that the only person who ever really touched her, these days, was her daughter, when they hugged. Marjorie wasn’t even one for hugging her own friends when she chanced to see them. It was behaviour she was not used to.

A tear pricked her eye. Everyone here was being really nice to her. It was a new experience for her and she was finding it difficult to accept.

‘Hi, Marjorie!’ called the girl in the yellow cardigan, loudly enough for Raymond to now know who she was, Marjorie realised. ‘Come and sit over here with me.’

As Marjorie sat down with her tea and cake, she studied Stacy. In a way it was infuriating that she couldn’t remember where she knew her from. But did the girl want to be her friend, like Eileen or Taynor had suggested they could if they wanted to, last week? Goodness, there was at least a sixty-year age gap between them! The thought made her chuckle as she placed her tea and cake on the table. She took a large mouthful of the cake to stifle her laugh and it was so delicious it made her sigh instead, which elicited a remark from Stacy.

‘Good, isn’t it? Everyone’s saying they’ll come every week if we get chocolate cake. It’s a real treat isn’t it? I don’t get to eat cake much,’ Stacy said with a sad smile. ‘So did you make any suggestions? Did you put them in the box or just tell Eileen? I just told Eileen I’d like to go to the sea for the day. I’m a country girl you see. My parents have always worked the land. Mum said we stayed in a caravan in Mablethorpe when we were little. We went there to see our cousins, but I don’t remember it. So I’d really like to go to the seaside proper. I work in a library near here. Don’t mind it – it’s a bit boring sometimes but it’s near where I live and it means I can keep an eye on my cats. I’ve got eight cats, you know. They’re a bit rowdy and I got scratched recently but I do love them. So what do you usually do with your time or do you—’

‘Good grief! Please stop!’ hissed Marjorie, covering her ears.

The other women around the table gasped, their mouths opening ever so slightly in shock at Marjorie’s response. Marjorie glanced about herself nervously. Oh no, I’m doing it again! she thought in dismay, judging by the way the other women were scowling at her. Stacy’s eyes dropped to the table. The poor thing suddenly looked as if she was about to cry.

One of the women with the name Doreen on her chest took hold of Stacy’s hand.

‘It’s okay, love. I think this woman probably has a headache or something. I’m sure she wouldn’t have meant to be rude to you otherwise, would you, Marjorie!’ the woman said, glaring at Marjorie.

Marjorie felt flustered. Well, that had all come out wrong! She had wanted the silly young woman to shut up, of course, but she shouldn’t have said anything. She should have simply moved tables when she’d started annoying her – that much was clear. So she mouthed a ‘Sorry’ to everyone on the table and then gathered her tea and cake and moved to a different table – a table where there was just one other little old lady sitting there, eating her cake with a fork, and who seemed much more civilised.

However, whilst Marjorie munched her cake, she suddenly felt tearful. She was sure she didn’t really belong here, amongst these people, despite the delicious chocolate cake. No, this experiment wasn’t working for her. Perhaps she’d persuade Gracie to take her out for proper afternoon tea in an upmarket hotel somewhere instead of having to deal with these unbearable people, here, with their funny ways.

Then to top it all off, Stacy approached her table with two paracetamols in her hand.

‘I’m sorry you’ve got a headache, Marjorie. Here! Take these with a glass of water. You’ll soon feel better!’

Chapter 5

Gracie stood, with her hands on her hips – just like she used to do when she was a little girl, trying to stop her mother and father fighting, Marjorie thought wryly.

‘So when this girl approached you, you got up and left. Is that what you’re telling me, Mother? After what you said, which was totally rude and nasty, and then the sweet little thing gave you tablets because she thought you were ill? How can you ever face her again, after that?’

Marjorie didn’t want to row with Gracie today. And it irked her that Gracie used the kind of language that only someone who looked after schoolchildren would use when the students needed reprimanding. Not that Gracie reprimanded anyone at school. She only scolded her mother, which made Marjorie feel like a naughty schoolchild.

‘But she was so annoying; so needy. All her words were tumbling out and running into each other. There was no “off” button. It was like she hadn’t spoken to anyone in years and it was all just dribbling out of her!’

‘So that was enough to make you tell her off? This poor young woman’s manner? I thought the organisers said they wanted you all to make friends with each other?’

Marjorie buried her face in the tea towel she was using to dry their dinner plates.

‘But I don’t want to make friends with all those people down there. They’re a funny bunch of characters. And some of them don’t seem right in the head.’

‘Well, now I’ve heard everything! Have you heard yourself? You’re starting to sound like my father!’

‘Well now you’re talking rubbish. I’m nothing like Oliver,’ Marjorie snapped.

‘But we all know that the abused often become the abusers, Mother,’ Gracie said quietly. ‘You’ve let yourself down at that place and I must say I’m disappointed by your behaviour.’

Marjorie bit back the tears that threatened to overflow. Saddened by her daughter’s comments and unable to justify herself, she stomped out of the kitchen and snatched her coat off the banister, intending to go for a walk to calm herself.

A light drizzle accompanied her down the street. She found a wet bench in the little park nearby, and sat down. A man threw a stick for his dog. The dog kept retrieving it delightedly and running back for the man to throw it again and then they left. Marjorie let her tears stream down her face unchecked whilst no one was around. She sat there deep in thought until the rain matted her hair and she didn’t even flinch when a slow trickle wound its way down her neck.

She didn’t understand herself but, more importantly, she didn’t understand others. Their behaviour was different to hers. Sure, she knew they all had challenging lives; they’d seen and done numerous things and that made them speak and act differently to her. Horses for courses! She’d had a horrid life with Oliver apart from their wondrous gift of her dear Gracie and maybe some of those people at the community centre had lived through horrid lives too. That said, Marjorie could see there was something wrong with Stacy in a way that there was also something wrong with herself; loneliness being at the heart of it. But she couldn’t deal with other people’s problems – didn’t want to deal with other people’s complications – when she didn’t know how to deal with her own problem of coming to terms with what she’d suffered. The isolation, loneliness and fear she’d lived in because of Oliver had been debilitating. She was aware that the way he had treated her was probably the main reason she dealt with other people the way she did.

Because that’s all she had known for so many years.

She didn’t intend to go around hurting people but she expected them to understand when she felt annoyed about things or when she felt justified in pointing things out that needed saying. Problem was, people seemed to easily take offence at her words.

She’d often wondered if she’d spoken to someone in a professional capacity about how Oliver’s terrible behaviour had affected and hurt her over the years, would she have been able to put the past behind her and move forward in a more positive light? She knew that abused people didn’t always become abusers themselves, as Gracie had said.

Part of the problem was that she’d never managed to fathom why Oliver had been so angry towards her. His own mother had never understood it or been able to explain it, when she’d witnessed it first-hand and she’d refused to discuss it with Marjorie – just like Marjorie’s own mother. Perhaps the older generation preferred to sweep things, like that, under the mat.

When she’d sat and conferred with Gracie, years later, they’d realised Oliver’s problems couldn’t have simply stemmed from his stint in the army. Maybe his problems had started before that. Maybe there were things she’d never known about him, before they’d met? She’d known he’d never been a particularly warm and caring soul and even though she’d found out he’d been in prison for grievous bodily harm she just thought that was part and parcel of his ‘macho’ image – something she’d probably been attracted to in the first place, if she was honest. When she’d met him in her late teens he’d seemed exciting in a way that the other boys in her village never were. Of course, Marjorie also realised that preferring men with a ‘bad boy’ image had been many a woman’s downfall.

Or had his problems been the reason he’d left the army in a dubious way?

Marjorie sniffed miserably and tightened her coat around her. The drizzle was starting to make her feel cold. And now that she was thinking about things, she realised she hadn’t been happy for a while.

She felt as though she lived on the outskirts of other people’s lives. Sure, Oliver’s behaviour had initially alienated her from her friends and family. She’d felt so alone back then and she knew her ‘people skills’ were somewhat lacking. And, yes, his manner and the way he’d dealt with everything in his destructive, derogatory way had rubbed off on her, even to the point of her being rude to people, the way she had in the community centre with Raymond and Stacy today. But Marjorie also knew that if she didn’t come to terms with this unsavoury element about herself and do something about her behaviour, she might end up completely alone. Even her darling daughter might withdraw from her.

She shivered, partly because of the weather, partly because of that dreadful thought.

‘Oh, Gracie!’

She couldn’t bear to be without Gracie, now her life was entwined with her daughter’s. But what if Gracie asked her to move out or find somewhere else to live? She might do that for lots of reasons, one being her mother’s inability to be kind to others. Or, even more worrying, what if Gracie acted on her mother’s advice and found someone else to love and they got married? Her new husband might not want Marjorie living in their midst.

Wake up, Marjorie! Of course they wouldn’t want you living in their midst, if Gracie married someone new. Besides, who, these days, invited their mother to live with them?

That was a terrifying new thought to Marjorie. But, whether she liked that thought or not, it was a possibility. It was a possibility that could very easily turn into reality, especially if Marjorie gave it reason to. Falling out with her daughter about this unpleasant aspect of her personality wasn’t an option. Her outbursts had wrecked other possible friendships in the past, so she knew she couldn’t go on being destructive. It had to stop.

But how could she stop the things she said, when her words often popped out, unchecked?

She knew it had a lot to do with her indignation at all things unfair, unjust and unpleasant, zipping straight up to the surface and barrelling out of her. Life with Oliver had been all of those things. Oliver had never let her voice her thoughts, good, bad or indifferent. He liked women to be quiet and respectful of him, even though he’d certainly never been that way with them.

Marjorie’s insecurities probably stemmed from her not knowing how to deal with Oliver’s behaviour. Oh, she’d have liked to have fought back, just once. It would have made her feel a whole lot better about things; she might have even been able to move on, more successfully, if she’d ever had the guts to do that.

Gracie had wanted Marjorie to see someone about her problems with Oliver.

‘Maybe it’ll help you move on,’ she’d suggested.

Yet Marjorie conceded that she hadn’t wanted to speak to anyone about her problems with Oliver because she didn’t want to go over all that hurtful old ground again – especially spilling her guts to someone she didn’t know. And she also didn’t want to keep going back to see a counsellor week after week, forcing her to live through the whole sorry mess over and over again. That period of her life, Marjorie insisted to Gracie, was well and truly over. She didn’t want to keep thinking about it. On the other hand, she’d realised that there was no way she could change her behaviour by herself. She’d tried and failed miserably.

However, the incident at the community centre had brought it home to Marjorie that things had to change and not just because she wanted to be accepted by the wider community.

Primarily she had to change for her daughter. Gracie was young and vibrant in a way that Marjorie had never been allowed to be. And despite Gracie saying she hated men, she didn’t hate them in the same way nor for the same reason that Marjorie hated and mistrusted them. And despite her fear of being asked to move out if Gracie did meet someone new, Marjorie had no intention of standing in Gracie’s way when her daughter found someone to love her again. Gracie deserved to be loved again! The gift of love had never touched – would never touch – Marjorie and she was completely accepting about that. But she wanted Gracie to find that special someone.

Marjorie let out a long sigh. Why is life so darned hard sometimes?

She knew she no longer wanted to continue living as a bitter woman, marred by her past with an abusive husband. Marjorie wanted the chance to live as a woman other people would like to get to know because she was kind and considerate. She certainly realised she would never be classed as a sweet little old lady. But she could start by trying to be better; by trying to unlearn the wrongful message Oliver had taught her with his offensive actions.

She thought back to the situation with Stacy a few hours ago. Marjorie already knew that, deep down, her behaviour towards the nervous young woman had been wrong. Oliver had told their friends he felt justified to treat his wife howsoever he chose and Marjorie realised she’d done the exact same thing to Stacy that afternoon.

But it had made her miserable; it had made her daughter hate her a little and, worst of all, it had made Eileen take her to one side and suggest she go home, to have a think about how she treated people because they didn’t want any bullies in their midst. She hadn’t confessed that bit to Gracie. It was too shameful.

She’d been branded a bully! How totally devastating! Luckily, Eileen had been discreet enough to make sure no one overheard what she’d been saying to Marjorie. But even so, Marjorie had been so shocked at Eileen’s words, she’d wanted to shout out: ‘I’m not a bully! Oliver was the bully!’

Pricking tears filled Marjorie’s eyes.

She looked up into the large thunderous clouds that seemed to have made their way over to her side of the park. The day had started by being bright and hot. Yet the sky was now stubbornly dark and ominous and as Marjorie searched the sky for answers, the darkness suddenly broke and emptied its hefty thunderstorm mercilessly down on her heavy heart.

Chapter 6

Raymond’s son Simon was stirring their teas in the kitchen, whilst staring out of the window at his parents’ beautifully kept garden. The lawn was trimmed and weed free, blue-tinged lacecap hydrangeas graced the far hedge, pale pink clematis climbed the garage and brightly coloured perennials sat in a small circular raised bed, towards the bottom of the garden, surrounding the base of the elaborate bird bath.

Raymond had lied about his arthritis to Marjorie. It was getting into all his joints now. He’d argued with his doctor as to whether it was partly hereditary or not.

‘It’s unclear,’ Dr Hien told him. ‘But we think familial concurrence has some bearing, yes.’

Why did professionals always talk in riddles? But when Raymond told his doctor about symptoms he’d found online, pertaining to something he thought he might have, she’d told him she would check him over and assess for herself what may or may not be wrong with him, based on clear medical evidence – not Google say-so!

Raymond knew Dr Hien would argue blue was black if he let her. But the point was, on his recent visit to her she’d told him that his increasing pains were probably his arthritis getting worse. She’d given him some medication, a list of exercises and a squashy ball for his hands that he quite enjoyed using now.

‘You know, Dad,’ Simon said suddenly, snapping Raymond out of his reverie, ‘I think we should do something about these steps by the back door. Makes it awkward going down to the garden, when you’ve got something in your hand. You’ll be tripping over them next.’

‘Well, son, you’re right, of course. I’ve no idea why someone would build a bungalow and then have steps of any sort coming off it. It certainly makes carrying tea or a meal out into the garden most precarious.’

Raymond had made Dianne’s mug of tea exactly how his wife liked it – quite strong, with only a little milk and just half a teaspoon of sugar. And then he picked it up and carried it outside to where she was in their sunny garden. Simon followed behind with the other two mugs of tea, setting Raymond’s down beside him before retreating to the shade by the house, to read his sporting newspaper.

Raymond sipped his tea, enjoying the comforting feeling of the hot sun on his face.

It was stickily hot today after the thunderstorms yesterday. Should’ve cleared the air a bit but it hadn’t. There’d be no working in the garden today. Not that anything really needed doing. But Raymond did like to potter, liked to keep on top of things. Before Simon had rung and said he was coming round to see them today Raymond had thought it best to put his feet up and chat to Dianne in their favourite spot. Isn’t that what long hot summers were for? Relaxing? Yet he could have easily fallen asleep in the sun if it wasn’t for Simon calling round.

When Raymond gave up his carpentry business and Dianne retired from nursing, they’d decided to sell the family home and retire to this little one-bedroomed bungalow. They’d also given Simon and his wife, Jo, a cheque for £10,000 from the proceeds of the sale of their house, ‘to help with anything you need help with!’ and then they’d gone on the journey of a lifetime, visiting the famous blossoms in Japan, sightseeing in New York and finally staying with Dianne’s sister in California for three weeks, before hanging up their travelling hats to spend the rest of their days, enjoying being near to their family and grandchildren.

Dianne had loved their little garden when they first moved in. It wasn’t so big that they’d be constantly working on it. Neither of them had wanted that. It was just right. It was one of the reasons they’d bought the bungalow, six years ago.

‘We need to get something manageable now we’re retired,’ Raymond had told her in the garden centre, when they’d first moved in. ‘Slugs like all the little colourful perennials and annuals you like! And you know I don’t like killing slugs.’

She was the one for flowers but she’d relented.

‘Okay, but we’ll still have a little patch of my favourites as well as your shrubs,’ she’d laughed. ‘Or I can put them in a raised bed.’

‘Ah, but slugs can climb, my love!’

Yes, he was a shrub man, through and through, he’d told his son, which had made Simon laugh.

‘Sounds like you’ve got a beastly ailment when you say it like that, Dad; doesn’t it, Mum? Or you sound like a superhero! Not Superman but Shrub Man!’ Simon had grinned.

Simon was a postman and had married his childhood sweetheart, Jo, a hairdresser and they’d had twin girls.

‘You see? I get to have girls in the family, after all!’ Dianne had informed Raymond proudly, all those years ago, when Jo had let her hold them at the hospital, a few days after their birth. Their skin tone was a soft caramel, much like hers; their hair in dark wisps, too. She’d always wanted to present Raymond with a daughter but it hadn’t happened. Yet now she had two girls to mollycoddle. Oh, it had been joyous babysitting them, whilst the twins were growing up and then keeping up with their exploits when they went off to college, unsurprisingly, both wanting to be hairdressers and opening their own salon.

‘Confusing to your customers though,’ Dianne had said when the girls had told her what they wanted to do.

‘But we have to be together, Gran,’ Maya told her. ‘It’s what we’re about. We’ll make it work. I’ve told Esha I’m happy to dye my hair if there’s a problem.’

And she had, too. Aubergine purple! Dianne couldn’t imagine a worse colour but it actually suited her. Luckily her sister Esha never had to dye her wonderful dark curly locks, although in the course of their work she had experimented with lots of different ‘looks’. But Dianne and Raymond had been completely proud that their granddaughters’ business had been a roaring success. Both girls were married now, with tiny babies of their own.

Raymond loved to reminisce in the garden with his wife, especially on beautiful summer days like this. It was their thing. They always took their tea together, at the bottom of the garden where the hedge shaded them from their neighbours, near Raymond’s crimson azaleas, until they fell or his lacecap hydrangeas for which – they were both surprised – he’d won prizes several years ago!

‘We do have to make the most of life, though, don’t we, love.’ Raymond smiled but the air around him was warm and still, apart from a couple of sparrows squabbling in the bird bath.

‘Well, I went to the second afternoon tea party at the community centre yesterday as you know,’ Raymond told her. ‘And I took my suggestions, as Simon recommended I should. It’s so nice to have your say and be heard, sometimes, isn’t it, dear? Did I enjoy it, you ask. Well …’ He looked down at the grass between his toes. He liked the feel of his bare feet on the cool lawn, even though Simon had mentioned earlier that his father ought to have been wearing sandals, in case he trod on something unpleasant. ‘There was some trouble there, unfortunately. One of the ladies was very rude to a young girl who I can tell has problems of her own.’

Raymond finished his tea; his wife’s had gone cold when he picked up her mug.

‘I think I might just try it again next week, too, love. I’m starting to make some new friends there and I know you said you wanted me to do that sort of thing when you got ill. Wouldn’t have dreamt about going anywhere without you at first, though, would I? But I’m improving now because they’re an easy crowd to get on with, in general.’

He stood up with a bit of a wheeze as the deckchairs were quite low; perhaps he should buy some new ones, more upright, easier to get in and out of. But he and Dianne had had those deckchairs forever. So it was quite hard for him to think about giving them up. Just like it was hard to give up his darling wife to the dreadful accident she’d had last year.

‘We’ll leave you alone now, love; Simon’s taking me to go watch the footy again with him. That’s nice isn’t it? He looks after me now his Jo’s left him. That was a shock though, wasn’t it? Never saw that coming, did we? The girls are good about taking turns visiting them both, though. So he’s not too lonely. Truth be told, I’m still a bit lonely, love. But on the whole, life’s not too bad. Anyway, we’ll speak later.’

He kissed the top of the urn, sitting proudly in centre stage of the bird bath, at the bottom of the garden by the hedge, shaded from their neighbours, surrounded at its base with all the pansies, peonies and marigolds that Dianne used to love and enjoy when she was alive.

Chapter 7

‘For God’s sake, Dora! You’re like a flibbertigibbet. Go find something useful to do instead of moping around like some gangly teenager. It’s a shame your father treated you like a ruddy princess when he was alive because, as I constantly need to remind you, real life comes with hairy armpits. And will you leave your ruddy face alone? It’s how God intended,’ her mother, Yvonne, bellowed.

At forty-nine, Dora was fed up of life.

It hadn’t turned out the way she’d hoped because she’d never really known what she’d wanted to do in life. At school, the careers advisor had tried to encourage her with things like hairdressing, floristry or nursing. But none of those professions had appealed to her. And whereas her friend Jodie always knew she wanted to be a beautician, Dora never had aspirations in any particular direction. And because she knew her father would always be there for her, picking up the tab, no matter what happened, she’d drifted through life, cherry-picking, knowing she never really needed to have any career aspirations.

‘If I choose wisely, I can always be looked after by a wealthy husband,’ was her comeback, whenever her mother had asked what she intended to do in life.

‘Better get a move on then, love, because there’s a ruddy great long queue in front of you, all looking for the exact same thing!’

Her mother, ever sceptical, had never stood for what she used to call Dora’s ‘nonsense’ back then. Even now, at the ripe old age of eighty-nine, she was a still force to be reckoned with. When Dora had been a young girl she’d been spirited, too, and not quite as respectful of her mother as she had been of her father, when he’d been alive. She’d never questioned anything he’d said or done. Didn’t need to. His word had been king. Not that there was ever anything to judge him by or criticise him of. He’d been one of those exemplary people whom everyone looked up to: staff, customers, his children and wife. And he’d done very well for his family.

***

Her father, Martin, as her mother liked to tell everyone, came out of his mother’s womb, ‘knowing what was what from the get-go!’ A shrewd businessman, all his business deals turned to gold, which meant his family would never want for anything in life.

Even as a boy, he’d been at his happiest selling things like his brother’s old bike or an old chest of drawers from their garage while his parents were out shopping. And when he’d left school with few qualifications, Martin had worked in an auctioneer’s, doing what he’d always liked doing best – buying and selling. He’d beavered away, saving up all his commission and wages, with his heart set on buying cheap decrepit old buildings in the right location, and turning them into profitable themed accommodation, one by one.

By being in the industry he found out where all the best places, for the best prices, were. So by the time he’d got married to Yvonne and long before they’d started their family, he’d procured four properties and turned them into Hen & Stag Hotels, sited just outside London. They became incredibly popular and did a humongous trade because of Martin’s relaxed attitude to the clientele’s private enjoyment of the Jacuzzis and other raucous entertainment, setting the scene for riotous but very profitable behaviour.

And once they’d settled into their enviable lifestyle with a big house overlooking the sea, they’d had their kids. Stuart first, followed by Dora, possibly a little late in life. Then with Yvonne’s insistence Martin did an about-turn and purchased another property which, between them, they turned into their Arts & Crafts Hotel in the Cotswolds. They aimed for a different clientele, offering mid-week inclusive breaks for Painting and Drawing or Photography for Beginners, as well as weekend courses of Basket Weaving or Jewellery Making: Beads, Bracelets and Clasps.

It seemed Martin’s magic touch could do no wrong within the industry of themed entertainment. All his properties were highly profitable and constantly packed to the rafters. Martin’s dynamism had set his family up for life.

‘And the “B” plan – if it doesn’t work out, guys – is that we’ll become property developers and turn the ruddy lot into flats or houses and make our fortunes that way!’

But it had never come to that. Updating his properties whenever necessary meant they hadn’t fallen victim to changes of trend. So they all had jobs for life. Dora’s brother, Stuart, married but with no children, was the manager of the themed hotels; her father was overall sales and marketing director and her mother, even up until very recently, had headed up the bookkeeping and bookings team.

As a teenager, Dora had reluctantly done stints as a waitress and chambermaid in the hotels during the school holidays, at her mother’s insistence to gain a bit of what she called ‘real-life experience’ rather than swanning around spending the family’s fortune, as her father would’ve had her doing. Dora had certainly been a daddy’s girl, and her father had doted on his precious daughter. He certainly wouldn’t have had her paling at the sight of vomit in the Hen & Stag Hotel bathrooms that she’d had to clear up, her mother standing over her with a bucket of hot soapy water, when Dora first started working there. But he wouldn’t have sided with his daughter against his wife, either.

‘We have to teach her some responsibility and life skills, Martin. She has to learn that life isn’t always about spa days and holidays in Florida,’ her mother had pointed out, as Martin slipped his daughter a couple of crisp £20 notes for her troubles.

At odds with her mother, Dora finally left the family home; left a hated secretarial job and dumped her two-timing fiancé at age twenty-six, to travel Europe and America, refinancing her travels with bar work or nannying whenever she felt like it. She never settled anywhere or with anyone for too long; slumming it on Californian beaches with sun-bleached surfers or bedding down with arty types around the theatre scene in Paris and generally having the time of her life, whilst she tried to decide what she should be doing. It was a far cry from the constraints of family life in Hampshire, even though she didn’t have to want for much in her family’s luxurious surroundings.

Back then, however, even though Dora still didn’t know what she wanted out of life she realised she wanted to live her life on her own terms. Not her parents’ terms.

‘Secretarial and hotel work is simply not for me,’ she’d told her best friend Jodie, who’d repeatedly asked what Dora was going to do next in life, each time her current foreign boyfriend dumped her.

‘But don’t you want to come back and settle down at some point, hon? We could have so much fun again!’ Jodie pleaded.

‘But they want me to work in our hotels and it’s just not what I want. My mother won’t let up about it. She says it’s where I belong.’

So Dora continued to kick back at what her parents wanted for her by staying away and living as freely as she pleased. However, her father’s first stroke – which, fortunately, didn’t kill him – had seen her running back to the family fold. Dora had missed her father. She hugged him while their tears mingled as he held her tightly, forgiving everything, pleased she was finally home.

‘I’ve missed you so much,’ they both spluttered.

His health scare had, however, made him reassess his life and he’d called a family meeting to discuss the pressures of running their family businesses and the toll it was taking on everybody, not just himself.

‘I mean, aren’t we doing this so we can have a good life? We don’t want to be killed off too early because of it,’ said her father, convalescing, afterwards. ‘And I think I need to change my tune about you now, Dora. You’re what? Bloody hell! You’re thirty-two and still single? Your mother is right, princess, it’s high time you took on a bit more responsibility. You’ve enjoyed a carefree life for years. But we need some help, here. Your mum’s seventy-one, even though she doesn’t look it and even though she’s still got plenty of get up and go in her. But she should’ve retired by now. Heck! We both should’ve retired by now. I’m seventy-four.’

‘But, Dad!’ Dora had started to pout and then got a ‘quit whining’ look from her brother, Stuart.

‘Leave it out, sis,’ said Stuart. ‘You’ve had a cracker of a life so far. But back to reality. This is what’s real!’

‘Your brother’s right, Dora,’ her mother snapped. ‘So we’re getting the staff together and putting some new priorities in place. You’re not tied to anyone and you don’t have kids or a husband anywhere we should know about, do you? Don’t pull that face. You never tell us anything. That’s why I’m asking. No? Right, so therefore you’ve got no particular reason to go running back to wherever it is you hang out these days – Spain, did you say?’

Dora had stared sullenly at the patterned carpet and took hold of her father’s hand.

‘I don’t want you to die, Daddy.’

Stuart had scowled at her but her father had drawn her into a long hug.

‘I’m not dying today, sweetheart. But it’s going to happen some other day. And before that day comes we do need to sort some things out. So can I count on you to help towards that or at least help us make some decisions about things? Your mother will need all the help she can get whilst I start taking things a bit easier. That stroke has put my left hand out of kilter. And that’s my phone and writing hand, so things are going to be a bit difficult for us at the moment. I’ve already spoken to Stuart and he’s going to take over my role whilst I’m off sick with a view to taking it over permanently, even when I start to get better. He’s recruiting that Damian chap as the manager. He’s a reliable sort I believe. Been with us three years already, as bar manager, so he should do a good job. And your mother needs a certain someone to step up and help out, too. So do you think you can do that for us, Dora darling?’

Dora didn’t want to be stepping up anywhere. She was still searching for her life, the last time she looked.

‘I guess, Dad. But it’s not where my heart lies. I still don’t know where that is but I’m pretty sure it’s not in cleaning up after people or making their beds. I mean, there’s no way I could be a nurse, that’s for sure!’

‘Of course, darling.’ Her father had nodded soothingly. ‘But I think your mum could do with some help behind the scenes in the office, just until we sort things out on a more permanent basis.’

She’d pulled a narky face, despite her mother shaking her head. Inwardly, she’d have liked nothing more than to run away from that responsibility. She’d never liked the hotel life she’d been made to endure when she was younger. She’d have enjoyed working on the front desk as a receptionist in those days, but her mother had insisted she start at the muddy bottom and work her way up, which had put her off working in hotels for life!

‘Look, Dora, surely you realise you’ll be able to offer a better service to your customers as well as understanding the problems the staff face on a regular basis by doing this. And then, of course, the hope is that it’ll make you a better boss at the end of the day, when you and Stuart inherit the businesses,’ her father had said.

Inherit the businesses? So that’s what all this had been about? Dora had never wanted to inherit the sodding businesses. She’d always intended that to be Stuart’s baby when the time came for her mother and father to check out, as it were.

That type of commitment, whereby she’d have to cultivate and tout for business and then maintain that business, was too much for her. She wouldn’t be able to live a carefree life, that’s for sure. And though she’d never really known what she wanted to do in life, she’d certainly never envisaged taking on the family businesses.

All she’d ever loved doing was romping around interesting countries with equally interesting men in tow, even though she’d blown the last one, Pepe, out after she’d caught him stealing her money for his roll-ups and vodka. He wasn’t the love of her life, even though the sex had been terrific. So, at the time, her foray home because of her father’s ill health had coincided with her limited choices of what to do next. Their tiny airless studio flat in Alicante was still there awaiting her return if she decided that was her plan, though she’d told Pepe it was not.

On the other hand, it was marvellous to be back amongst the lavish trappings of her family’s home environment. She could sleep in her beautifully furnished bedroom when she wanted and eat what she wanted, when she wanted. She didn’t have to do things like go out with Pepe on his boat to catch flapping, gasping fish for their supper or spend hours scouring the markets for all the items she needed to make everything from scratch. Dora simply did not expect to have to do things like killing, skinning and gutting things in order to eat. That’s what supermarkets were for, to take the stress out of finding food on a daily basis. She found life so much more civil at home in the UK. She knew she would starve if she ever found herself stranded on a desert island.

So looking down on her father, on his sick bed that day, Dora had sighed deeply, just to let everyone know she wasn’t happy with the suggestion that she ‘pull her weight’. Yet whilst she didn’t like to admit it, she could see that it did made sense for her to stay and help her folks get things sorted and settled for a little while because she really had nowhere else to go. Plus a stint in the office would be infinitely better than cleaning up after their mainly boozy guests. So it just might be do-able.

Yeah, but then I’ll be gone, she’d told herself.

In fact, not only had Dora stayed to help out for a few months, but she’d stayed working in the family business for a good few years longer than she intended. And she did everything from bar work to, yes, cleaning toilets when the situation arose, as well as running the accounts team and sitting in on the monthly meetings and putting her points across in a professional manner. Remarkably, she found she quite enjoyed managing people and, surprise, surprise, her parents had been right – working from the bottom up had put her in a good place for dealing with problems the staff faced. Thus business and life in general, for Dora, was trotting along at a good pace and they’d just secured another small hotel in London with a view to turn it into a boutique spa hotel when her father suffered his second, fatal stroke.

And then – almost overnight – everything suddenly changed.

After the funeral, one of Martin’s business associates asked if he could buy the four Hen & Stag Hotels and Dora’s mother said ‘Yes,’ without flinching. Those hotels might have given them an enviable lifestyle but they’d never been places Yvonne had felt comfortable in, even though that’s where she made Dora do her first few years’ work experience.

Stuart had just gotten divorced and decided to take a year out and tour Australia. And there, on a train between Sydney and Brisbane, he met Hazel, the woman he was now married to. They’d moved to Devon and ran a hotel there, complete with her young daughter, Stephanie, and a rescue dog they’d called Ozzy. The Wallabies, Dora called them all. A property developer bought the boutique spa hotel in London and Dora’s mother sold the family home and flat but kept the Cotswolds hotel she now lived in and ran with Dora. And even though Dora would later admit that it wasn’t such a bad thing, no longer running around the world with the likes of Pepe, she still had her off days when she wished she could just do that.

Hence why her mother’s recent outburst had Dora lamenting to her friend Jodie that life was becoming ‘predictable’.

‘I’m still living at home with my ox of a mother, for God’s sake! And she thinks I should be settled and married like The Wallabies by now.’

‘Aw, honey,’ Jodie had crooned. ‘But you’re not the marrying kind.’

Admittedly, Dora had certainly evaded that institution! But she’d soon be fifty, a fact that concerned her greatly because, where had all that time gone?! She was certainly at an age where she no longer felt happy in her own skin and had not been on a date or hooked up with anyone delectable in years. She felt as though she was drifting again, with no particular direction in mind. She seldom went out, unless Jodie rang out of the blue and they spent a rare weekend together at Jodie’s home, back down in Southampton, getting rat-arsed down the pub, whilst her bloke was working night shifts for his security company. Yet it somehow felt wrong that she was still living with her mother. In fact, everything felt wrong with her life.

‘It’s all slipping away from me, especially since my looks have faded,’ she’d whine to anyone who’d listen.

So, fed up of her friend’s whinging, Jodie had rung one day with a suggestion.

‘Look, why don’t you have a shot at Botox or whatever. Works wonders for me.’

‘No chance! I don’t like pain and what if it all went wrong?’ Dora had blared, robustly.

‘Look, just have a think about it. I can send you a whole bunch of literature on it.’

Just a little nipping and tucking could work miracles, the brochures had said. The glittering photos of the before and afters had certainly looked inspiring. And there were all sorts of procedures to choose from – invasive and non-invasive. And so, reassured by Jodie, Dora had asked her friend to drive to their hotel and then dragged her along to her appointment to try out a bit of Botox.

When they got back to the hotel Yvonne had squinted at the results, and then pulled a face. ‘Is that a botch job or what?’

Disillusioned, Dora went back to try and get it sorted out the next day.

‘Oh I’m sorry, love,’ the receptionist had told her. ‘You have to wait till it wears off. Round about three to four months after your first injection, sometimes less. And then we can have another go at it.’

‘What? So I’m supposed to look like a frog in the meantime, am I?’

‘You must’ve moved while they were doing it,’ Jodie had said, suppressing a giggle. ‘It should’ve been fine. Oh, don’t worry about it. Just put a bit of lippy on and smile more instead of frowning. Anyway, I thought the intention was to get your forehead done? Not your mouth.’

‘I know but I hate my saggy face! And anyway, you should’ve persuaded me to use your chap.’

‘But you rarely get leave of absence from your hotel. Plus, like I said, he’s on holiday. Anyway, it doesn’t look that bad.’

Despite her friend’s encouragement, she didn’t feel any better and her smile was definitely wonkier than it had been. She wasn’t sure that a bit of lippy would help but clearly there was nothing she could do about it all now.

‘Oh, how I hate getting old and decrepit,’ she’d groaned to her mother.

‘You behave like a small child!’ her mother had snapped. ‘Just grow up and find yourself a man and settle that roving spirit of yours.’

‘Well, that might happen if I looked prettier than I do. But just look at my crow’s feet, my lined forehead, my crappy skin.’

‘What do you expect after sitting on a beach for nearly ten years?’ her mother had shot back. ‘And do you hear me whinging about my looks?’

Dora snapped. ‘No. But you’re allowed to be wrinkly at eighty-nine. It’s expected of you.’

Their sparring had become amiable over the years. True, she had been a daddy’s girl and absolved of all failings and errors because of that. But now she was much closer to her mother. She was even closer to The Wallabies and popped over to see them sometimes, when being in one place for too long took its toll.

Yet it was on a rare couple of days’ visit to see her mother’s sister, Aunt Philippa, in Southampton, after nagging her mother to leave the staff in charge of the hotel and come with her because she was fed up of doing things by herself, that Dora spied a flyer in a shop window offering free afternoon tea at a nearby community centre, the following day. And it transpired that the building was on a road parallel to where Philippa lived.

So because Dora was feeling out of sorts and generally fed up with her life she decided to act on that flyer and find out what afternoon tea at the Borough Community Centre was all about. And as her bloody mother had complained about her moping about, she intended to leave her mother and aunt to catch up whilst she went off on a little adventure for the day.

Who knows, Dora thought, it might just cheer me up a bit.

Plus it said she was going to get a free cup of tea and a piece of cake.

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