‘What I’m really looking forward to’, said her mother, when Lizzie’s father had been seen off to his meeting and supper cleared away, ‘is hearing about the weekend you spent in your friend Vanessa’s house. I want every detail! I could hardly believe my ears when you told me you were going.’ She topped up both wine glasses although Lizziehad drunk very little of hers. ‘I met Mrs Brinklow – you remember they own that electrical shop in the High Street? I had to tell her. She’s always telling me how well Christine’s doing.’
Lizzie knew this. All her life she had been compared unfavourably to Christine Brinklow. They weren’t even in the same year at school, which was a blessing, yet Christine was always held up as the model daughter. Now she wondered what would happen if Christine Brinklow got pregnant out of wedlock. The sky would fall in. Except it couldn’t now happen because Christine Brinklow had got married the previous year. Lizzie had been a bridesmaid and worn a very unattractive dress in peach satin. All the bridesmaids had looked hideous.
Lizzie took a deep breath and prepared to tell her mother what she wanted to hear. ‘Well! The house was enormous! A stately home. It was a bit intimidating going to stay there, to be honest.’
‘I’m sure you were fine. You have lovely manners and, as I always told you, good manners will take you anywhere.’
Except to that house, Lizzie thought, although to be fair to her mother, it was her short dress and not how she held a knife and fork that had made her unwelcome.
‘There were lots of people staying. Relations mainly. That meant all the big bedrooms were taken. Vanessa put us all up in the nursery which waslovely. Super views! We had a peep into Vanessa’s room which she’d had to give up for someone.’ No need to go into detail. ‘It was gorgeous. All the furniture was antique.’
‘I suppose it would be. Old houses are always full of antiques. And what was the food like? Did you have tea in the drawing room?’
The questions went on and on and Lizzie made every one of her replies positive. When her mother heard her daughter had done the flowers for the ballroom she was beside herself with pride and joy. ‘You always were brilliant at flower arranging! As well as needlework. Such a clever daughter! Wait until Mrs Brinklow hears that my little girl did the flowers for an important ball in an English country house!’
Put like that, it sounded like quite an achievement. ‘They did turn out quite well, I must say. But I had a huge cutting garden to pick the flowers from. That was so lovely. Not like scrubbing round our gardens to find enough things in flower to make a decent display for the church. It took ages though.’
‘Flower arranging does take ages!’ Lizzie’s mother sighed. ‘We do miss you from the flower guild. It would be lovely if one day you came back down here and could be part of the community again.’
‘I was never a proper member of the flower guild, I just helped out.’ Lizzie needed to stop her mother from working out ways that this might be possible –the ideas would involve a local boy who lived locally and wouldn’t move.
‘It was obviously good training for you,’ Lizzie’s mother said with pride. ‘Now tell me about this barn dance that went on before the ball?’
That part was easy to describe – she’d been there. But when Lizzie was expected to describe the ball, dance by dance, her imagination was stretched a bit. She focused a lot on the dresses – some of them were actually real. Then she made up a few dance partners, their abilities taken directly from the various boys who’d attended the dance classes Lizzie had been to while she’d still been at school. By the time she’d finished, Lizzie was almost convinced she’d actually been at the ball, and not frantically tramping across muddy fields before getting into a leaky boat and very nearly drowning.
Exhausted after all that storytelling, Lizzie gave an enormous yawn. ‘Would you mind if I went to bed, Mum?’ she said. ‘I think whatever it is I’ve got is making me tired.’
‘Of course not! I’d forgotten you were ill for a minute. I’ll bring you up some hot chocolate. You get up to bed immediately. Have a bath if you want. Very soothing for problems “down there”. You can use my bath salts.’
An hour later, Lizzie was snuggled up in her old bed, drinking hot chocolate and reading aChalet Schoolbook. She knew she had reverted to childhood,but it made it easier to cope with the smother-love her mother heaped on her.
As she snuggled down under the blankets she realised that her being pregnant was almost bound to shatter all that. It would shatter her parents’ lives as much as it would hers.
Visiting a doctor who’d given you first prize in a bonny baby competition when you were six months old was about as embarrassing as embarrassing gets. But Lizzie needed to be brave and not beat about the bush.
‘And what can I do for you, my dear?’ said Dr Sharp. His avuncular expression made her shudder a bit.
Lizzie tried to smile back. ‘I think I might be pregnant.’
His expression went from fatherly concern to deep disapproval in an instant. But he didn’t comment. ‘How late for your period are you?’
‘I’ve missed two periods.’
His frown deepened. ‘Could there be any other reason for a missed period?’ Disapproval was etched in every line and wrinkle in his elderly face.
‘I don’t know what else causes it.’ She felt less guilty about it all now. If he could be so cold about it, so could she.
‘Are your periods normally regular?’
‘As clockwork. And I feel perfectly well, apart from not wanting to drink coffee or wine.’
‘I suppose we’d better take a test.’ He hardly looked at her. He reached into a cupboard behind him and produced a paper cup. ‘It may be too soon to tell. It’s very early days. Give the sample to the nurse please.’
He got up. The consultation was over.
As she walked out of his room to reception she swore never to see him again if she could possibly help it. She was not having that grumpy old man looking after her through her pregnancy.
‘How did you get on?’ asked her mother the moment Lizzie arrived back on the doorstep.
