The second she started crying, I started crying, and a supermarket employee who had been restocking the cream cheese quietly removed himself to the next aisle over.
‘I wish I had as well,’ I croaked. ‘And I wish we weren’t having an emotional breakthrough in the middle of the supermarket.’
‘It’s the nice supermarket, as well,’ she choked on her words, swiping at her face with the back of her wrist, attempting to regain her composure. ‘I once saw Jon Hamm here buying Pepto-Bismol and loads of toilet paper.’
‘Thanks for shattering a dream,’ I replied as I pulled her in for a hug right there between the pasture-raised double-yolk organic eggs and the artisanal imported buffalo milk burrata. ‘What kind of toilet paper was it?’
‘Four-ply,’ she wailed into my shoulder, her entire body shaking with tears. ‘The really nice stuff.’
‘Good for him,’ I whispered, stroking her hair. ‘He deserves it.’
The last person I would ever expect to find waiting on a doorstep was Myrna Moore and yet, when we pulled into the driveway with our bags and bags of shopping, there she was.
‘Phoebe, darling,’ she cooed, lifting her enormous sunglasses up over her eyes. ‘There you are. I’ve been ringing the bell for an eternity, I assumed you’d died.’
She looked like an actress playing an actress. Her shades and her cigarette holder accessorized a pristine,ruby velour tracksuit, and her glossy black cane rested against the front door. The silver Rolls-Royce waited dutifully in the street below, its engine purring softly.
‘And this must be the sister who prefers to throw my mail over the wall than deliver it in a civilized manner.’
‘And you must be the woman who has terrified so many postal workers they daren’t attempt to deliver your mail correctly in the first place.’ Suzanne set down her shopping bags and held out her hand. ‘Suzanne Chapman, pleasure to meet you.’
‘Oh, I like her,’ Myrna said as she shook my sister’s hand. ‘Now let me in before I expire in the street and everyone thinks I’ve turned to drugs.’
‘To what do we owe the pleasure, Ms Moore?’ Suzanne asked, guiding her into the living room while I fumbled with the fancy instant-boil kettle, wondering which mugs to use, which tea to brew. What would be up to Myrna’s exacting standards?
‘The party-planning people have taken over my house and I couldn’t bear to be around their nonsense one second longer.’ She peered around the room with an openly critical eye but made no comment. Practically the highest compliment she could bestow. ‘Since your sister was the one who suggested the shindig in the first place, I assumed it would be reasonable for me to take refuge here.’
‘We were actually on our way out,’ I started to say but Suze cut me off with a sweet smile.
‘Phoebe does love to get herself involved in other people’s business,’ she said. ‘You’re welcome to stay as long as you like.’
Myrna walked slowly around the open-plan room before deciding on the uncomfortable-looking, high-backed chair I’d assumed was only there for decoration.
‘A lot of years have passed since I stood in this house,’ she said, her eyes combing the walls, the floors, the ceilings. ‘Hasn’t changed much from the street but I wouldn’t have recognized it from the inside. I imagine that’s true of most of the old houses still standing.’
‘You should visit Ren,’ I suggested, dunking the teabags aggressively in and out of the boiling water. ‘I’m sure that hasn’t changed too much.’
‘Joe Garcia’s boy?’
I nodded as I transferred oat milk from the bottle into a tiny jug, placed the tiny jug on a fancy tray and carried everything over to the sitting area.
‘Marvellous idea, you’ll come with me. Let’s go.’ Myrna leaned against her cane to pop up to her feet, immediately striding across the room towards the front door. ‘Suzanne, dear, I’ll see you at the party tomorrow evening. Chop chop, Phoebe, I haven’t got all day. Some of us are old, you know, and I refuse to die while wearing a leisure suit.’
Suzanne looked up at me from the settee, trying not to laugh.
‘Enjoy the tea,’ I muttered, chasing after our guest as she barked my name and leaving my sister to drink three mugs all by herself.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Since Myrna wasn’t getting any younger or more reasonable, we drove, or rather we were driven, around the corner to Ren’s house.
‘It looks the same from here,’ she said, her uniformed driver opening the car door and helping her out. I offered him a grateful smile but was met only with stoic resolve, and followed her onto the uneven pavement, keeping close to her side. So many of the roads were buckled and broken, huge potholes threatening to bugger up unsuspecting vehicles, and I hadn’t seen a single stretch of pavement longer than ten feet that wasn’t cracked in two or adorned with the protruding root of a tree. Fifty million-dollar houses and fifty-cent pavements, it was unbelievable.
‘Rosa planted those apple trees,’ Myrna pointed towards a miniature orchard in one corner of the front garden, full of pretty trees bearing small, shiny apples, not quite ready to eat. ‘She was a keen gardener. I always saw her out here when I took my daily walks around the neighbourhood, but that was a long time ago.’
‘How come?’ I unlatched the gate, very much hoping Ren wouldn’t be at home. ‘You don’t like to walk any more?’
‘I stopped walking around the neighbourhood when I stopped recognizing the neighbourhood,’ she replied. ‘The hip replacement doesn’t help much either.’ She made her way through the garden, her expression cloudy with memories as she paused in front of every plant and tree.
