29
‘It can’t have been easy for you bringing up Ruby all alone.’
When Henry said nothing, I went on. ‘Without her mother around, I mean?’ I started assembling the ingredients to make the mac and cheese that Henry had passed me from the huge fridge. To say he was a self-confessed foodie, there was nothing in front of me that suggested we were going to end up with anything other than a bog standard, run-of-the-mill mac and cheese. I looked at the supermarket packet of macaroni, the huge block of fluorescently orange cheese and the bottle of skimmed milk, and racked my brains.
‘No, it’s not been easy,’ Henry eventually replied, looking terribly sad. ‘She can be a handful. I’ve tried my best with her.’
‘I’m sure you have,’ I said, eager for him to know that bringing up a bolshy eleven-year-old single-handed was bloody hard work. I should know – I was doing just that. ‘I know how hard it is and I ama woman…’ (Yes, Jess, I berated myself,it’s pretty obvious you’re a woman and, if you don’t stop glancing across at him, he’ll soon realise you’rea womanwith the hots for him.)
I turned my back on Henry, attempting to hide my flushed cheeks by making inroads into the cheap block of cheddar he’d given me. I bought exactly the same block from Aldi solely for Arthur, who couldn’t get enough of the stuff – I’d had to ration him to a couple of pieces a day, but it was a great way to tempt him in from the garden or into his basket at bedtime.
‘I’m actually looking at boarding schools for Ruby at the end of this academic year,’ Henry was now saying. ‘I’m away a lot and Kateryna isn’t perhaps the best person to leave her with.’
‘Oh?’ I turned back at that.
‘A bit… you know…’
‘Not overly motherly?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Where is she now?’
‘Oh, out somewhere. She said if I was having guests, she’d keep out of the way.’
‘Right.’ I frowned. ‘I thought that’s what housekeepers did? Stick around to help?’
Henry paused. ‘I wanted to have you all to myself…’ He appeared suddenly shy, uncertain. ‘I’m sorry, that sounds awfully forward of me, Jessica. I just wanted to get to know you.’
‘Oh!’ I didn’t know what else to say, how to react, so out of the loop at being chatted up I didn’t even know if Henry was actually doing just that. I should have asked for a couple of lessons from Serena over a glass of wine down at The Dog and Duck:How to know when you’re being chatted up, or simply been invited round to make the kids’ tea?
‘Listen, Henry, do you have any other kind of cheese?’ I asked, realising that if not we’d be ending up simply with tired macaroni in a cheap cheese sauce.
‘Erm, hang on.’ Henry turned back to the fridge and I followed.
‘Ah, great,’ I said. ‘You’ve gruyere and some bacon. Right, a loaf of bread – a sourdough would be good? No? A white sliced loaf. OK. I can do something with that. Cream? Yes, here we are.’ I pulled out the said goodies like a conjuror revealing hidden hankies.‘You see’ – I smiled – ‘you need decent ingredients to make a decent mac and…’
I broke off as a whiplash voice snapped, ‘Mum, what are youdoing? What are you doing inRuby’s fridge?’
‘Oh good, Mrs Butterworth.’ Another voice overrode Lola’s. ‘Are you making supper? I bet you’re a brilliant cook, aren’t you? Can I do anything to help? Would you like me to grate the cheese? I love cooking, but Dad’s hopeless. He thinks he’s pretty good, you know,’ she went on in a confidential whisper as she stood at my side at the huge kitchen island, ‘but, honestly, he burns the toast, his scrambled eggs are like rubber, and we never bake… Oh, haveyoumade these? These brownies? Your mum iswonderful, Lola.’ Ruby turned back to Lola, who appeared somewhat bewildered at her mate’s gushing praise.
Or was it sycophancy?
‘Why don’t you two lay the table.’ I smiled. ‘This will be ready in fifteen minutes.’ I offered a matey smile in my daughter’s direction, but she was having none of it. And I understood, I really did. I tried to imagine, when I’d first fallen so much in love with Dean when I was just sixteen, if Mum had suddenly appeared in Patricia Butterworth’s kitchen (perish the thought: a suspicious Patricia would never have let Mum over the doorstep, never mind take over her kitchen), delving into Patricia’s cupboards and fridge, taking over the cooking and getting Dean on to her side when he wasmine? Was it any different for poor old Lola that her mother had appeared on the scene, pushing her nose in where it wasn’t wanted, getting Lola’s new best friend on her side?Taking her off me!would, I was sure, be the clarion call that would go up in our house once I got Lola home.
I could see the comments if I were to post on Mumsnet:
AIBU to start taking over, dressed in my best skirt, showing off my cooking skills at my – bolshy – eleven-year-old’s new best friend’s house when, in truth, I fancy said new best friend’s single and rather gorgeous dad…?
It had taken me ages to work out exactly what AIBU actually stood for.
And was I actuallybeingunreasonable? More than likely, in Lola’s eyes.
‘Yes, why don’t you do that, Ruby?’ Henry asked, bringing me back to the present, opening a bottle of Merlot and sniffing at the cork before leaving the bottle to breathe and reaching into a cupboard for red wine glasses.
‘You can see how much Ruby is in need of a mother figure,’ Henry said, stroking my arm briefly before moving to look out of the window into the garden. ‘Someone to, you know, bake with her? I suppose that’s why she’s so badly behaved at school.’
‘Possibly,’ I said. ‘So, Lola tells me Ruby’s mother died at birth. I’m so sorry.’
